


(But We Don't Have to Be)

by LandofWordsandNonsense (RiaHawk)



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Buckle up people, Canon Typical Violence, Disassociation, Gen, I apologize for Google translate German, Ikithon is back on his bullshit, Panic Attacks, Starvation, Werewolf!yasha, World of darkness AU, changeling!Jester, changeling!Nott, everyone is a WoD archetype, finding your found family, holy shit this is long, hunter!Beau, modern with magic, more characters to be added as story progresses, playing fast and loose with D&D too, playing fast and loose with world of darkness, self-indulgent meta au, should probably assume spoilers, vampire!Caleb, vampire!Molly, werewolves and vampires and fae oh my, yasha and molly are platonic soulmates
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-18
Updated: 2020-02-02
Packaged: 2021-02-08 10:56:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 42,957
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21474859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RiaHawk/pseuds/LandofWordsandNonsense
Summary: Werewolves haunt the forests and vampires stalk the streets, while hunters try to contain them both and changelings and mages just try to go about their business. Most of them have good reason to fear the others. The world of darkness beyond the mundane reality is a dangerous place, after all, and the phrase 'top of the food chain' can be a lot more literal. Werewolves are vicious, vampires are cruel, hunters are uncompromising, changelings are duplicitous, and mages meddle with forces they shouldn't. If the denizens of the world at the edges agree on anything, it's that.The Mighty Nein are a family, and there is no force on heaven or on earth that will prevent them from finding each other. No matter how long it takes, no matter what it takes, they'll always find a way to get each other back.Even in a world where by rights, they should all try to kill each other.
Relationships: Jester Lavorre & Beauregard Lionett & Mollymauk Tealeaf, Mollymauk Tealeaf & Yasha, Nott & Caleb Widogast
Comments: 47
Kudos: 181





	1. Fenris

**Author's Note:**

> So I decided to finally kick this thing off. it's been in the works for a long time, and it is officially the longest thing I've written, and one of the only long form fics I've done. Hoo boy. It is part of an entirely self-indulgent AU that frankly I wanted to read... so I'm writing it. XD Updates will be more or less regular... at least until I get through my backlog of chapters. Then we'll see what happens from there~

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It starts with a wolf in the woods...

_ Contrary to popular belief, lycanthropy is not an infectious disease spread by blood to blood contact or saliva. It is instead a hereditary trait passed down by certain bloodlines. Likewise, those born with lycanthropy are not mindless killing machines, or at least, no more so than your average human is a mindless killing machine. They are capable of shapeshifting, moving from a human form to the form of a wolf at will, passing through an interim hybrid stage that is admittedly likely the source of the archetypical 'wolfman' made popular in various media. Their strength does come in part from the moon, it is believed, but not entirely, and their ability to change form is not tied to the phase of the moon. They prefer to keep to themselves and their close family, although some can be loners. It is thought that lycanthropes are territorial and violent when provoked, but in general, they do not mean any harm to the average populace, although they will often respond to danger with a show of unrelenting force.... _

-BE, "World of Darkness: Essays on the Supernatural"

* * *

Traveling carnivals weren't really in demand these days. They were too quaint, too small, and generally too uninteresting to the general populace to really be worth making a go of it.

For the most part.

Fletching and Moondrop's Carnival of Curiosities managed to eke out _ just _ enough interest among certain demographics... mostly college-age goths, theatre folk, and general creative types who were in the market for something somewhat off the beaten path to support itself. It was small, a single tent that was raised the first night they arrived in a new town and taken down a week later, with a handful of acts in the hour-long show (two shows a night), a small collection of side-show quality kicknacks and artifacts to draw more interest and a couple more bucks a head, and a few old midway games that had been salvaged from other traveling shows. Their PR was two social media accounts and sometimes flyers printed out at the cheapest print shop they could find posted in bars and on campuses, and word of mouth. The whole carnival was no more than seven people, and fit neatly into two RVs, a pickup truck, and a trailer.

It was _ absolutely _ not what one would call profitable, and sometimes they had to live pretty close to the bone, but it was enough for them. The traveling life suited them, some more than others, and in fact it could be said that a few of their number _ needed _ to travel. For different reasons.

Of course, it helped in the long run that none of them were really what anyone could consider... _ normal _. It made life difficult, sometimes, but it also made it easier to draw and please the small crowds that supported them. A little nudge here, a little tweak there, and throughout, the subtle use of all the tricks at their collective disposal gave them an advantage that most traveling shows didn't have... or at least couldn't afford. It gave their shows a taste of unreality that was more than the product of special effects, ironically making them more real to the audience. There was something about the Fletching and Moondrop show that seemed hokey and poorly constructed when one was just talking about it, but seeing it in person was a different thing entirely, and left their audiences, tiny as they were, enchanted.

Occasionally literally.

It was a queer sort of patchwork family that had found each other across the years, coming together in spite of all the reasons they never should have. Gustav and Desmond were the first, meeting each other by chance one night, and seeing in each other kindred spirits despite their vast differences and even theoretically mutually exclusive natures. Ornna had joined them soon after, drawn in by their uncanny friendship and their individual oddities. Then the twins, Mona and Yuli, who noticed the way that they accepted things that they, by all precedent and common knowledge, absolutely should not have accepted. Bo the Breaker hired on soon after them, just looking to get away from the harshness and mundanity of his life. Little Toya was the most recent addition, an orphan they'd found on one of their stops and had taken in.

They _ should not _ have meshed. Some of them should have been the bitterest of enemies.

But carnival folk have never been the sort to let their behavior be dictated by what the world at large thought they should do.

Sure, some of them didn't entirely get along; the twins liked to tweak Ornna, and she thought they were cunts, and often, she and Gustav quarreled about the direction the show should take. But they were a _ family _, dammit, despite all the reasons they shouldn't be, and they looked after each other, shoring up each other's weaknesses. Between them all, there were very few things they couldn't deal with in one way or another. Not that they were particularly eager to court trouble, but sometimes, trouble found them.

Like it might have now.

There were eyes on them as they moved around the field they'd rented for the week, had been since they'd started setting up last night. Gustav and the twins had noticed it first, and it made them tense, but everyone had been so busy getting things set up that they'd been able to distract themselves with some success. And the first night, it hadn't been so bad. It could have just been one of a lot of things, drawn by curiosity or instinct.

But it was still there, and now it was starting to get on _ Ornna's _ nerves. While whatever it was hadn't done anything _ yet _, it was hard not to read the continued watching as a threat, and she didn't like things that threatened her family. She couldn't tell what or where it was, just that it was there. She scanned the trees around the field again, but came up with nothing. Muttering under her breath, she looked around their makeshift fair ground. Gustav and the twins would be in their RV until nightfall. Desmond and Bo were trying to manhandle the old shooting gallery into place... the latter with considerably more success than the former. She still thought Bo was a little crazy, working with the midway games with no gloves on and rusty iron everywhere... Toya was-

Ornna frowned. She didn't see Toya anywhere. "Toya!" she called sharply. There was no reply, and Ornna stopped what she was doing. That feeling of being watched crept up her back, and she reached into her pocket for the bone-handled fire starter she always carried. It was always easier and safer to do things when they could be passed off as special effects during the show... but the only people around to see right now were the ones who already knew the difference and had their own ways of doing things. Bo, in fact, had looked up at her shout, and was carefully settling the shooting gallery so he could step away, already _ looming _ a little in a way he didn't normally. "Toya!"

Then Toya stepped out of the treeline, waving cheerfully, and both Ornna and Bo relaxed. The woman went over to Toya, arms sternly crossed. "Stay where we can see you, Toya," Ornna scolded. "Don't go in the woods without one of us."

"Sorry, Ornna," the little girl whispered. "I didn't go that far away, I just wanted to play with the dog."

Ornna raised an eyebrow. "Dog?" Toya pointed back the direction she'd come from, and Ornna automatically looked to see what she was pointing at. Then she involuntarily took a step back.

Standing just inside of the treeline was the biggest wolf Ornna had ever seen. It was enormous, with a coat that looked almost gray from a distance but something about the way it shifted in the dim light through the trees suggested a more complex color pattern. It was just standing there, watching them quietly. Somewhat incongruously, it appeared to be wearing a tiny flower crown, which was almost certainly Toya's doing.

Bo had come up behind her, and stopped short when he saw it too. "...Ornna."

"I see it." She took another step back, and Bo followed suit, nudging Toya behind the both of them. "Bo, you'd know better than I would-"

"I think it is."

Toya looked at both of them, confused. "But it's a nice dog," she said in her tiny, crackly voice. "It let me pet it and put flowers on it. It didn't hurt me..."

The wolf considered them for a few more moments, then deliberately turned around and walked back into the woods. "...I'm sure they didn't, dear. But I want you to stay out of the woods while we're here," she said with a calm she really didn't feel. Toya nodded. "Good girl. Go ask Desmond if he needs any help making lunch, okay?" Toya nodded, stood on her tiptoes to hug both of them, then skipped off.

Bo rubbed the back of his neck. "What do we do? I mean, they've left us alone, but if... Gustav and the girls, they'll be able to _ tell _, won't they?"

"Can you take them, if they decide to start something?" Ornna asked as they turned back to camp.

"Probably? Depends on which kind they are, they were pretty _ big _ just in that shape. And if they've got packmates nearby. One, maybe two, I can probably handle, more than that..." He shrugged a little helplessly. "I don't like backing down from a fight, but it's just me during the day, unless you want to risk hurting yourself." He paused thoughtfully. "Or if Desmond can talk them down, some of 'em are reasonable."

Ornna nodded. "Then we'll just have to take a few more precautions than usual and hope we can avoid trouble." She considered thoughtfully. "Do you have any silver dust?"

"No."

"Well, it was a thought. I'll see what I can come up with."

* * *

She wasn't really sure what to make of these people. She had been watching them since they'd arrived, bringing the scent of otherworld with them. The older woman smelled like fire, and the melancholy older man smelled of Other, but both of them were all human under it. The younger man and the little girl also smelled of Other, of far away places and stories to greater or lesser degrees, scents that she had never encountered but knew by instinct or dim ancestral memory. Creatures to be treated with respect and caution, but nothing that seemed like it was a problem she needed to deal with.

No, the problem was the other three. The two young women and the other man. They hadn't come out of their vehicle until the sun had set yesterday, and had gone back in before the sun rose. All three had the same scent, and _ that _ one she knew. It was a vague mixture of decay, blood, and something else that she could only describe as tainted or corrupted. Others of her pack would have known what she meant, but it was quite beyond her capability to articulate. Under normal circumstances, she'd have probably given battle immediately, even with three of them; pack wisdom held that they were anathema, and it was their duty to see them destroyed. Most of the time, that was right. There were a lot of monsters in the world, and some were worse than others.

But these three were different. She didn't know how, but they were, and it confused her. For one, they were traveling with others, two of which weren't any more mortal than they were, and she wasn’t all that sure about the other two. And their companions _ had _ to know, they took too much care to accommodate certain idiosyncrasies. The man and the woman that had seen her earlier had clearly recognized _ her _ for what she was too, even at a distance, and a little while later, she had seen the woman carefully putting bright silver jewelry in front of the door and windows of the camper. It wouldn't have _ stopped _ her if she thought she needed to do something about the situation, but it certainly would have given her _ pause _. So at the bare minimum, the woman knew what they all were, and probably the other adults did as well. It was strange.

She'd been watching the three of them sharply last night, ready to step in to prevent them from killing anyone when they went into town after dark... but while she'd smelled blood, no one had died, and when she got close enough to get a good look, all she'd found were a few people a little out of it and dizzy, but not even seriously inconvenienced or left somewhere unsafe. So they took care with what they did... which just might mean they were smarter than average, she wasn't sure.

But the part that confused her the most was the little girl. Young, and innocent, and much closer to mortal than some of them... and obviously cherished by the whole group. She was happy, and as healthy as she could be it seemed, despite the close presence of the three that concerned her. She'd been surprised when the little girl had spotted her and come over to her fearlessly, gently petted her fur, and happily made a flower crown that she'd placed over her ears with great dignity. She'd had ample time to look over the girl, and try to smell any trace of the corruption of the other three on her, and hadn't found anything unduly concerning. She never would have let the girl go back if she had, but she hadn't.

Despite her nature, she wasn't inclined to start a fight if she didn't have to... although she showed no hesitation when she _ did _ , and fought with all the fury of her pack. These three seemed... reasonable. And she had always believed it wasn't what you were but what you _ did _ that truly made a monster. So she'd wait, and watch some more, and satisfy herself that these three were truly no real threat. And if that proved to not be the case... well, she'd faced worse odds than three vampires at once.

* * *

"Ornna!" Bo ran up to her, breathing hard, and nearly sparking with distress. "Toya's missing!"

It was late afternoon, and there was no crowd to speak of, not even really any customers; there wouldn't be until probably closer to the show. So there was nothing to stop Ornna from bolting to her feet, ignoring the rickety popcorn machine she'd been filling. "What do you mean, she's missing?"

"I mean she's gone. She was working on her lessons by the trailer, but when Desmond went to look a few minutes ago, she'd left her books and was just gone." He looked around. "And something's stirred everything up."

That would explain the strange, unpleasant feeling that was making Ornna's hair stand on end. But it would do no good to panic. "She didn't just wander off?"

"Well, she _ could _ have, but there's something _ wrong _. Both Desmond and I can feel it."

Ornna nodded decisively. "You'll have the best chance of finding where she's gone. Look your way, do what you need to do. Tell Desmond to stay here and tell anyone who shows up we're closed, and keep an eye on the others. If we haven't found her by dark, they can help us then. He can keep everything coordinated in the meantime."

Bo nodded, then looked around worriedly. "What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to try to get help, and then I'm going to look _ my _ way."

"Help? From _ who _? There's not a freehold for miles and you said you wouldn't ask any of your colleagues for help if your life depended on it..."

"There are other people I can approach. Go, you can see what I can't."

* * *

They were still lurking around the field they'd set up in; while none of them had seen the huge wolf again after the first day, the feeling of being watched had never gone away. They had at least kept their distance, small favors. But right now, Ornna thought it would be easier to find the wolf than it would be for her to find Toya. Sure it was a risk, but what was life without a little risk now and then?

So she was walking briskly through the stand of woods, alert and on the lookout. And she still almost missed them. She'd just passed a tangle of undergrowth next to what could charitably be called a pond, when movement caught her eye, and she whirled around. The wolf was less than four feet away, calmly watching her as they took a drink. Now that she was closer, Ornna could see that what's she'd originally mistaken for a gray coat was actually a sort of gradient... the wolf's fur was black at the roots, shading out to white at the tip. Their eyes were strange too, heterochromatic- one blue and one purple- and contained a frightening amount of intelligence.

For a moment, they just watched each other.

Then Ornna spoke. "I know you can understand me. You've been watching us for days now, don't know why. And right now, I don't care. You've left us alone, so I'm callin' it a truce. Right now, our littlest is missing, there's only two of us as can look for her before sunset, and she may not have until sunset. I may not even be able to _see_ what's going on, depending on what it is. There's those as say you folk are protectors. So I'm askin'. Please. Help us find Toya and bring her home."

The wolf lifted their head and stared at her for a long minute. Ornna forced herself to just stand there equably, neither fleeing or getting aggressive. Then, almost imperceptibly, the wolf nodded and turned to vanish into the woods. Ornna let out a breath she didn't know she'd been holding, and set about doing what she could to aid the search.

* * *

She didn't know why the woman had sought her out for help, but she couldn't find it in herself to not answer the call. She hadn't noticed it before, but now that she was looking for it, there was a sort of turmoil in the air that made her hackles rise. But she remembered the girl's scent, and it didn't take her long to pick up the trail. And when she did, she was glad that the woman had asked for her help, because the girl's scent was overlaid by a thicker, altogether nastier one that boded ill for everyone. She didn't know exactly what the smell _ was _ , not in specifics... but she knew a bane when she smelled one. There was going to be a fight, even if the girl wasn't with it when she caught up with it. _ Especiall _y if.

The trail led further away from town, deeper into the woods, and she snarled when she felt the change in the atmosphere where it seemed to get colder and darker. The scent of the bane was getting stronger, and there was so much of it it was hard to smell the girl as well, but her scent was still there at least, just hard to pick out. She was also starting to notice the way the vegetation had been trampled and matted down, like something big had been along. Even a nose-blind human could follow this trail...

She'd been following the trail for almost an hour when she started hearing something crashing through the undergrowth ahead of her, and went low to the ground, approaching cautiously. She was faster and a lot more nimble than the bane, and caught up with it in short order. It was enormous, a sort of gray, half-reptilian mass of warped flesh, so far gone she couldn't even tell if this thing had _ ever _ been human. She crept a little closer, trying to judge its capabilities, and then she saw the tiny, pale figure it clutched to its chest with one dripping paw, and she saw red.

She'd meant to be careful about this, but that went out the window right away. She couldn't help it. The rage overwhelmed her, and she shifted. Muscles bulged as she rose to a bipedal position, her muzzle lengthened, her front paws spread out and realigned into hands sporting absolutely vicious claws, and her fur rippled as her shape went from lupine to more humanoid, almost giving her a mane around her head and face. By the time she let out a blood-curdling battle howl, she was fully seven and a half feet tall and massive in proportion. The bane spun around at her howl, but by the time it saw her, she had already flung herself at it.

It was bigger than she was, but her strength was almost a match for it, and it wasn't prepared for her assault. She snarled in its face, claws raking across its chest and leaving deep gouges in it that leaked a sickish, horrible smelling nasty ichor. The force of the hit knocked it back a few steps, but it bellowed at her and took a clumsy swing at her. The hit caught her glancingly, and she shook her head and snarled again before hitting its shoulder as hard as she could with both claws. She left more bleeding furrows in it, and severed one of the tendons, making its arm go slack. It dropped the girl, bellowing in fury.

She was present enough in her own head that she immediately leapt away, putting some distance between her and it, hoping it would chase her; there was a genuine danger it could trample the girl. It _ did _ go after her... but not entirely the way she wanted it to. A long, slimy tongue shot across the intervening distance and wrapped around her torso. It tried to yank her off her feet back towards it. She was able to get just enough purchase to stay put, however, and she gave an enraged, snarling howl. She wrapped her claws around the tongue and yanked back, which the bane did not like. It charged at her, its useless arm flailing and the other lashing out at her. It scored a pretty heavy hit on her, and she snapped at it in retaliation, before throwing herself at its bulk again. Now that it wasn't holding the girl, she could _ really _ let loose. She clawed it again, then used the momentum of the movement to scramble up onto its back where it couldn't quite reach to fling her off. It put her in exactly the right position to go for the eyes.

The bane roared and stumbled in a circle, trying to get her off. Just as it managed to turn 180 degrees, it took a heavy impact to its stomach and staggered backwards. The source of the blow proved to be an enormous, pale skinned, solidly built creature with stubby horns, nearly as big as she was but built stockier, wielding what appeared to be a heavy stone cudgel. The physical appearance was different, but the smell was familiar. There was something very strongly Other about it, and after a moment, she placed it. It was the same smell the younger man from the carnival had, and she found she wasn't nearly as surprised as she'd have thought she'd be.

But that didn't matter. What mattered right now was that there were two of them now, and each of them individually was strong enough to give the bane pause, and the two of them together was more than enough to overwhelm it. Between her claws, and the man's pummelling, it honestly didn't stand much of a chance. That wasn't to say they both didn't take a hell of a beating in the process, but neither of them cared much. The bane ultimately dropped in an inert heap, hitting the ground hard enough it literally shook. Then it started to dissipate into foul smelling, acrid black smoke, going back to whatever umbral realm it had come from.

They both separated, keeping some wary distance between the two of them. Presently, though, the man nodded. He was still breathing hard, but he seemed satisfied, and his inhuman form seemed to flicker and recede behind his human shape again, though his smell never changed. The cudgel likewise vanished, replaced by a claw hammer tucked into his belt. A moment later, she nodded as well, and shifted back into her smaller, preferred lupine form. Then she moved over to the girl, sniffing her cautiously. The man picked the girl up and studied her face carefully, brushing her hair out of the way. "...She'll be all right, I think. Just needs some rest and... well, she can get what she needs back at the carnival."

She huffed a little, and licked a gash in her shoulder. Then she started back in the direction of the field at the edge of the woods, stopping after a moment to look back at the man in an obvious hint for him to follow her. He did, after a moment or two.

It didn't take as long to get back as it had to find the bane since the path wasn't so roundabout and there wasn't the same need for caution, but it was still after dusk when they reached the edge of the woods. The three from the RV were talking to the other man, looking worried, and seemed to be discussing how best to split up and start searching.

"We found her!" the younger man called, and all four of them whipped around, then surged forward to cluster around him and the girl in his arms.

It was strange. She had always been told that vampires had no hearts or true feelings, but the relief on their faces put lie to that. The man was even crying as he gently stroked the little girl's hair. There was some quick, urgent discussion between the three men, and the melancholy one nodded after a bit. "She's just exhausted and drained, I think, but she'll recover in time. We'll help her."

The male vampire nodded. "Good. Mona, Yuli, can you go find Ornna and let her know Toya's safe? We can't reach her cell."

The two young women promptly turned to dart off into the woods... although both of them gave her a wide berth. She was standing at the edge of the woods, holding herself a bit apart and unsure of quite what to do. She wasn't prepared when the remaining vampire looked up to meet her eyes. "...Thank you," he said quietly.

A bit nonplussed, she sat down and scratched behind her ear.

"I know you probably have no reason to trust our kind, but thank you. She's family."

She huffed again, and then gave a small nod. That seemed to satisfy him, because he nodded back. After another moment, she got up and took herself away, melting back into the woods.

She still didn't understand these people, but now, she felt that she could at least trust them to behave like people and not monsters, and that was the important part. And now that the question had been answered, it was probably time to move on. She didn't like staying in one place too long. She'd do a little hunting to depart on a full stomach, then see where the wind and rain took her next.

It must have been past nine or ten when she'd decided she'd caught her fill of rabbits, and started off, moving through the fields and bushes parallel to the road. Walking on the road was sometimes easier, but you only made _ that _ mistake once...

She didn't know how long she'd been traveling when she smelled it. It was a sudden, ugly thing; the breeze shifted and all at once all she could smell was human blood, and a lot of it. She broke into a run, feeling a little sick. Five minutes later, she found it. There was a little clearing near the road but out of view of it, and something terrible had happened here. She saw a human body curled up nearly in the center of it, covered in blood. There was another scent she could detect now too, now that she was closer. It was the strong scent of corruption and decay, the smell she associated with vampires. And it was _ everywhere _.

It was a stronger, harsher scent than she associated with the carnival folk, and a part of her that probably should have had something better to do latched on to a discrepancy she hadn't noticed before. The vampires at the carnival had a much milder scent of corruption around them, smelling more of old blood and travel. The corrupted smell here was so strong it was nearly overpowering, and only slightly offset by a sharp, almost minty smell. For a moment, she wondered if they smelled less of corruption because they retained more of their humanity. She certainly couldn't see the same people who'd been so worried about their little girl doing this to another human being.

She approached the body cautiously, ignoring the way the still-damp blood got between her paw pads. It was on its side. After a moment, she nosed it carefully, then did it again a little more firmly, turning it over onto its back. The moonlight was strong, even with the clouds, and allowed her to see most of the scene. It looked male, with thick dark hair that was matted with his own blood, and she got the idea that under normal circumstances, his skin would be a rich dark reddish-brown color, like the coneflowers that bloomed alongside the road, but right now, what wasn't covered in blood was washed out and sickly. His throat had been torn nearly out.

Then there was a rattling wheeze in the man's chest, and she practically leapt back. He was still alive... for the time being, at least. After a moment in which she assured herself that he was too weak to be a true threat, she approached again, sniffing at him carefully. Then she realized what must have happened. He wasn't _ dead _ , not _ yet _ , but he wasn't exactly _ alive _ either. The taint was already in what blood he had left, but whoever had attacked him hadn't finished the job. Why, she didn't know.

She'd only seen an incomplete turning once, when she was much younger, before she’d left her pack. They had been tracking one that had attacked some of their kin, and had come across a woman he'd tried to turn, but lacked the strength to make a good job of it. There was no cure, so the elders said, no way back. There were only the options of continuing to go forward, or of a quick, merciful death. Otherwise, an incomplete turning was a slow, painful death sentence. Not human enough to survive the sunrise... not vampire enough to withstand the blood loss. But just enough of both to stretch it out as long as possible. They'd snapped the woman's neck out of pity. 

This was already a dead man, he just hadn't stopped breathing yet. It would be kinder to put him out of his misery now; he must be in a lot of pain. But she'd need hands for this; she didn't dare use her teeth on someone this far over the edge. She shifted, and knelt next to him, gently sliding her hand under his neck. A quick wrench and it would be all over.

As she touched him, his eyes snapped open. They were full of blood from ruptured capillaries, and looked entirely red. At nearly the same time, a cloud moved out from in front of the moon, and in the stronger light, she saw the spray of peacock feathers running up his neck and across his cheek that she hadn't been able to distinguish from the blood he was covered in before.

The moment she saw that, Yasha _ remembered _.

She remembered who she _ was _ , who _ he _ was, where they should have been, who else should have been at her side. She froze, and the man made a pained nose and a little gasp. "...Y-" But he cut off, unable to produce more than that.

That broke the spell. "_ Molly _," she breathed.

* * *

Ornna sat near their campfire, picking at the bandages on her hand. Her locating spell had blown up on her, and her phone along with it. It was annoying, but she was pragmatic, and knew it could have been a lot worse. At least Toya was all right, tucked into bed curled up against Bo, while Desmond played his violin. It would help. They hadn't had a show tonight due to the circumstances, but they hadn't missed out on much custom either, she thought. At least it had all worked out.

She didn't know what had drawn her attention and made her sit up straight until Mona and Yuli dashed around the trailer, both looking a little wild. "Ornna, what's going _ on _?" Mona demanded, her fangs a little more prominent than usual.

"What do you mean, what's going on?"

"Oh my god." Yuli’s eyes looked a little glassy. "Can't you _ smell _ it?"

"She's only got a human nose, she can't smell shit," Mona said snidely.

Ornna glared at them. "What are you two _ talking _ about?"

"All the _ blood _," Yuli said.

"There's so _ much _ of it," Mona added.

"What the _ hell _-" They were interrupted by the sound of crunching gravel, and all three of them whirled around to face who it was. Ornna gaped for a moment. The intruder proved to be an enormously tall, pale woman in crude, almost primitive clothing and furs. Her hair was black at the roots, shading to white at the ends, and tied out of her face in a series of tiny braids. Her eyes reflected the light coming from the nearby RV the same way an animal's did the headlights at night.

The twins were staring at her with identical stunned, open-mouthed looks. No, Ornna realized. Not at _ her _, at the bundle in her arms, held close to her chest. A second look revealed it to be a young man, and even from this distance Ornna could see that he was mangled and covered in blood, probably his own. Her head snapped up to look the tall woman carrying him in the eyes. Heterochromatic, one blue, one purple.

"I’m asking. Please," the woman said in a surprisingly soft voice. "Save him."


	2. Toreador

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Molly is brought back from the brink and joins his circus family, and as he's adjusting, complications arise.

_ Vampirism is an interesting condition. It is not truly a disease, and can only be transmitted by active intent. Many of the myths and legends surrounding it are in fact true- the most prominent of which are the vampire’s dependence on blood, and their inability to endure sunlight. Unfortunately, many of the legends regarding their weaknesses have been exaggerated, though there is a grain of truth in many of them. Most regard them as murderous parasites, and truly, few vampires do much to contest that impression. However, vampires need not kill to feed, and with enough care, would prove no real danger to the average person… _

-BE, "World of Darkness: Essays on the Supernatural"

* * *

Ornna stared at the woman for a good thirty seconds before she realized she ought to be doing something about the situation. She closed the distance between the two of them, and looked over the injured man in her arms critically. He was still breathing, if barely, though she wasn't sure _ how _ , with the amount of blood he'd _ clearly _ lost and the hole in his thr-

She frowned suddenly, and placed one hand on his chest. His heartbeat was barely there, and wildly irregular. If he'd been in a hospital, they'd have called a Code Blue on him four times already. Her hand moved up to his face, and she gently pulled his eyelid back, swearing at the film of blood that obscured the entire surface.

"I know," the tall woman said softly. "He's already in shadow. I can smell it."

"Hmph," Ornna muttered, then she turned back to the twins. They both looked wild and ever so slightly unhinged, but for the moment, they were too intimidated by the huge woman to get too out of hand. "Go find Gustav and tell him to get back here, and then find something to take the edge off. Neither of you has blood strong enough to do the job anyway."

They jumped when she addressed them, then nodded. "We'll be back before dawn," Mona said.

"Find Gustav _ first _ ," Ornna said sharply. "This boy hasn't _ got _ until dawn." They nodded, and scampered. Ornna turned back to the other woman. "Bring him over here." She opened the door to the RV that Gustav and the twins shared. It was a cramped space, but it was enough... and more importantly, it had blackout curtains in the windows. "You can put him on the sofa.... what is your name, anyway?"

"Yasha." She did as Ornna directed, carefully settling the man on the sofa built into the side of the RV.

"Hn. Yasha. You _ are _ aware that he's only got one chance now, right? You _ do _ know what you're asking us to do."

"I'm asking you to finish what someone else started because he's dying."

Ornna nodded. "So long as we're clear on that." She gave Yasha a sideways glance. "From what I know of your kind, they'd have killed him when they found him. Surprised you're going the other way. I thought wolves and vampires were natural enemies."

"...We can be," Yasha said, hesitantly brushing some of the man's blood-caked hair out of his face. "And my pack would tear me apart for suggesting it. But my pack isn't here and I am." She looked up and met Ornna's eyes. "I lost him once. I won't let it happen again." Then she shrugged. "I don't believe what you are makes you a monster, it's what you do. And I know him well enough to know he won't let himself be one."

"...You're unusually open-minded for a wolf, what I know of them."

That got a strange, sad smile. "I learned from... my friends."

"Hn. Well, it's none of my business. Anyway, it's not up to me if we can do what you're asking. That's Gustav's call, because he's the one who'll have to do something about it."

"Do something about what?" Gustav said as he ducked through the door of the RV. "Mona and Yuli said- oh." Suddenly, his nose flared as the smell of blood hit him. "_ Oh _." For a moment, he seemed to struggle with himself a bit, then shook his head and came over to them. "Who's this? What happened?"

"Someone botched a turn," Ornna said sourly. "That's what happened. She found him and brought him to us."

Gustav studied Yasha for a moment searchingly, then nodded. "Where was he?"

"By the side of the road, a few miles up... I don't know how far, exactly," Yasha said quietly.

"Why'd you bring him to us?" Gustav asked curiously. "Why not call emergency services?"

"They couldn't help even if I had a way of calling them," she said. "You can. And you are good people. In every world I've ever known you, you have always been good people."

Both Ornna and Gustav looked a bit bewildered by that statement, but let it pass as Gustav sat down on the low coffee table bolted to the floor. He studied the man's wounds carefully. "...Whoever did this... they savaged him...," he said soberly. "And... I don't think it was a botched job, I think they meant to leave him like that. I've seen people botch a turning. It's usually... cleaner."

That elicited a gutteral snarl from Yasha, and they both leaned away from her instinctively. Then she visibly forced herself to calm down. "Will you help him?"

Gustav studied her face for a moment while Ornna leaned against the wall. "...I'm willing. But you know what that'll entail."

"I do. It's all right."

Gustav shook his head. "No, dear. Nothing about this is all right, and we all know it. But it's _ acceptable _, at least?"

"Yes."

There was a pause. "He must be someone very dear to you."

She nodded. "He's my..." She stopped. Her what? Her best friend? Her brother? Both were true, but neither really went far enough. Their relationship had always been simultaneously too complex and too simple to articulate. "He is my heart," she said softly.

Gustav nodded. "I think I understand that," he said gently. "You probably ought to step outside now. I don't think you'll want to watch this."

After a moment, Yasha nodded, and moved to the door. Ornna was right behind her, and she closed the door behind them. "Gustav will take care of your friend," she said brusquely. "How steady are your hands?"

"...Steady enough when I need them to be," she said after a moment, a bit nonplussed.

"Good," Ornna said with a nod as she moved across to the other RV. "Desmond usually helps me, or I help him, but he's looking after Toya right now and that's where he needs to be."

"...helps?"

"If it takes, your friend is going to be weak as a kitten. He's not going to be in any shape to look after himself for a night or two. And I can't do this one handed." She pulled a small battered latched metal box out from somewhere Yasha couldn't see. When she opened it, it proved to contain an assortment of medical supplies, largely of the sort used by blood banks. Ornna produced some plastic tubing connected to what appeared to be a pouch of some sort, a device Yasha didn't recognize, and a package containing a fine needle.

"What do I need to do?" Yasha blinked at the various paraphernalia she was currently assembling.

Ornna pulled a strip of rubber out, then pushed her sleeve up and tied it around her upper arm, wincing a bit. She held the needle, now attached to the tubing, out to Yasha. "You need to slide it into this spot here," she said, tapping a place on the inside of her forearm. "Into the vein, with as shallow an angle as you can. I can do the rest, but I can't get the right angle with one hand." Yasha blinked at her for a moment, then hesitantly took the needle. "Can you do that?" Ornna said, with a raised eyebrow.

She blinked. "Yes. I have never done this before, but I think I can." She frowned, her tongue poking out of the corner of her mouth in concentration. She'd never had a shot or an IV or even been to the doctor before, but the principle seemed simple enough. After a moment, she inserted the needle in what seemed to be the indicated fashion, and looked at Ornna for confirmation.

The dour woman seemed impressed despite herself. "I've never seen anyone do it right the first time," she said with a small nod. "You might have made a good nurse."

"...I don't think I would have..."

"Well, maybe not." She shrugged fractionally. "Hold the needle in place until I say otherwise." Yasha did so, and Ornna manipulated the device, and they both watched the little plastic pouch attached to the tubing fill with blood.

After a moment, Yasha spoke up again.. "...It is good. That you take care of each other. Not many would." She wasn't surprised that _ they _ would, but it still bore recognizing.

"...Well, we're none of us normal. But you knew that already. That's enough, go ahead and pull it out." Yasha did, and Ornna put some cotton over the bleeding mark it left, holding it in the crook of her elbow. "That'll be enough to hold him a couple of nights, anyway."

"...Thank you. For helping him."

"You're the one trusting us."

She smiled faintly. "You trusted a wolf."

* * *

When Molly woke up, he immediately wished he hadn't. Everything _ hurt _, like he'd been crumpled up and run through a pasta machine.

...Upon consideration, that metaphor did not make one goddamned bit of sense and he should probably stop thinking about it for the moment.

There were soft sounds that suggested someone was nearby, and after a moment, Molly opened one eye gingerly, and immediately hissed a little. The light here... wherever here was... seemed fairly dim, but it still felt outrageously bright. It did not help his head.

"You're awake," a male voice said kindly. "I won't insult you by asking how you feel."

"...Awful." He paused. "...Thirsty." He'd never _ been _ so thirsty.

There was a sigh somewhere above his head. "Well, I can help one of those. Do you need help?"

Molly thought about it for a second, and tried to sit up. But he was so weak he could barely move. "...Yeah."

The man slid an arm gently under his back and helped him into a more upright position. Then he pressed what felt like a liquid filled plastic bag into his hands. Molly cracked his eyes open enough to see that it resembled one of those punch drinks that came in mylar pouches, with the plastic straw that you had to stab into them. It even had a straw attached.

The drink helped. It cooled the burning in his throat, and the rest of the aches and pains in his body stopped clamoring at him quite so much. His godsawful headache receded to a somewhat more bearable level, and he could actually think again.

Something creaked as the man sat down nearby. "What's your name, son?"

Molly gave a ghost of his normal sharp grin. "...Mollymauk Tealeaf. Molly to my friends." It probably wasn't the time or the place, but the joke gave him a sense of normalcy. "And we are friends now, aren't we?"

That got a low chuckle. "Might be a bit early for that. Gustav Fletching."

Something suddenly aligned in Molly's memory with a snap. _ Of course _ he was, who _ else _ could it have been? Who else would be taking care of him after... after...

_ After. _

He _ felt _ the blood leaving his face in a sudden rush as jumbled memories suddenly made themselves known. His hand tightened spasmodically on the drink package. Gustav leaned forward and grabbed Molly's free hand, giving him something to hold onto. "Do you remember what happened to you?" he asked gently.

"I was... hitch-hiking... doesn't matter where from or where to, just... sometimes you have to move on, you know? I remember someone stopped, offered me a ride." He shuddered. "I don't... I think there was more than one in the car? But I don't remember almost anything about them… I smelled a cigar? It's all.. it's a blur, mostly." He was shaking. "I do remember that they... grabbed me and tried to... I got away and ran. I fucked one of them up a little I _ think _, I hope I did. But they caught me. And... and..." He dropped Gustav's hand to instinctively clutch at his own throat.

It was a shock to find scarred, but unbroken skin there, and he opened his mouth to say something, but no sound came out, because he had run his tongue across his teeth, and had felt sharp fangs where there hadn't been any before. Then he looked down at the package in his hand. With a clearer head, he saw that it looked like the kind of thing he'd seen in hospitals, and though he'd somehow drunk nearly all of it, there was still some left and _ he damn well knew what blood looked like _. "Oh, fuck me," he said.

Gustav winced, and tried to put a hand on his shoulder comfortingly, but Molly jerked away. "Now, just calm down, Mollymauk. Molly. You're safe enough, and I can explain..."

Molly _ tried _ to calm down, he really did. But he was familiar with panic attacks, and he had about three seconds before he was balls deep in a massive one. His chest was too tight and it felt like his brain was revving in neutral, thoughts whipping around in his head too fast to make sense of them, until they flew away entirely leaving him in fog. Everything took on a vaguely unreal aspect and he suddenly felt disconnected from his body. The only thing missing was the fact that his heart wasn't racing.

"I am so fucked, aren't I?" he managed to get out before words deserted him entirely.

His heart wasn't racing because it simply didn't _ beat _ anymore.

* * *

Yasha was sitting on the ground near the RV when Gustav poked his head out. She sat up straight and looked at him with an intensity that made him almost draw back out of sheer instinct. But he managed to stop himself. "It took. He's awake." Some of the tension seeped out of her shoulders, and her gaze became slightly less terrifying. "However," Gustav continued, "I think you'd better come in here."

Without a word, she got to her feet and made straight for the door, and Gustav moved to let her pass.

Molly was sitting up on the couch, not quite curled into a ball, with one hand gripping the arm so tightly he'd torn the upholstery. The look on his face was incredibly blank in a way that made her skin crawl. She sat down next to him, and gingerly pulled him into her lap. Some things were always constants, and as long as she'd known him, he'd needed physical contact and comfort to ground himself. He still did, because once he was in her lap, he curled into her, burying his face in her shoulder and clinging to her with a surprising amount of strength. She just held him, stroking his hair gently. Someone, probably Gustav, had washed the blood out, and it was still damp.

It was actually a good sign when he started trembling against her, because that meant the numbness and inability to process was wearing off. She kept stroking his hair while Gustav moved around unobtrusively in the RV's kitchenette, giving them space. It still took the better part of an hour for Molly to untwist enough to lean into her a little more comfortably. "...Yasha?" His voice was small and fragile sounding.

She gave him a gentle kiss on the top of his head. "I'm here, Molly." And she was so fucking _ relieved _ . Obviously because he wasn't well and truly dead, but also because it had been possible he wouldn't _ know _ her. That he did was all she could have asked for right now.

"Everything's fucked, Yasha."

"...I know."

His grip on her tightened fractionally. "I'm something _ else _ now."

"...I know that too. We can deal with it."

He nodded against her shoulder. "You found me?"

"I'll always find you, Molly. No matter where we are."

He nodded against her. "Okay." He was quiet for a moment, and presently let go of the death grip he had on her, and moved one hand up to idly play with one of her braids. "My memory's a mess. Big surprise, isn't it?"

She just kissed the top of his head again. "Do you remember who did this to you?"

He shook his head. "No."

"That's all right. I'll know them when I smell them."

He pulled away slightly to blink at her. "When you _ smell _ them?" She flushed slightly, and leaned down to whisper in his ear. He blinked again, then leaned back against her. "... Okay, that's suitably ironic." He was on a better footing now, and his natural resiliency was kicking back in. Yasha's strong bulk under him helped, giving him something to climb out of the panic spiral he'd been in. "What about the others? I don't think they were with me..."

"It's just you and me right now," she said, shaking her head. "At least, I wasn't _ awake _ until I found you." Well, that made sense. If she'd brought him to Gustav, the others probably wouldn't be in the picture yet. "I'm going to go find them," Yasha said after a moment.

Molly nodded. "Okay."

"Ah... it's going to be best for everyone if Molly stays with us, at least for a while," Gustav said, as he decided to re-enter the conversation. He handed Yasha a mug of tea as he sat down. "At least until we can teach him how to survive."

"That sounds reasonable," Molly said. "_ Someone's _ got to, and I'd much rather it be nice people like you. And I'll try to do what I can to pull my own weight around here, I don't want to put you out."

Gustav grinned, and for a moment, they could just see the sharp tips of his fangs. "How do you feel about carnivals?"

"Love them. Used to work in one, a while back," came the breezy reply. "I can juggle some, and tell fortunes."

"Then we can find something for you to do." Gustave glanced over at Yasha. "What about you? We could always use someone to help with setup, and sometimes the patrons get a little rowdy..."

Yasha shook her head. "No. I have to find someone."

"Yasha comes and goes," Molly said, leaning up to kiss her jaw. "But she always comes back."

* * *

Three months passed.

Molly settled into his new circumstances in a surprisingly short amount of time.... but then, he'd always been an adaptable little shit. It wasn't _ ideal _, certainly not, but he could live with it. Maybe it would be different if he hadn't been with the carnival. Probably would have, actually. But neither Gustav nor the twins were interested in killing anyone, and as long as they were careful, they could get what they needed without really hurting anyone. And they were damn sure to teach him how to do the same. They also taught him what to look out for, and there was a certain feeling of security in knowing he was surrounded by people who would look after him.

And, okay, he missed being able to go out in the sunshine. But he'd always loved the moon more.

It really was nice, being with the carnival. He fit in nearly seamlessly, another member of their little makeshift family. Yasha showed up periodically to check on him, though she was having no luck on her search. It was almost like old times, and even now, there was a lot to enjoy, and Molly absolutely planned to thoroughly enjoy himself.

Right now he was thoroughly enjoying making out with a pretty young man with colored beads in his long dark hair in an alley behind a bar. It was a meaningless little thing for both of them, just a little affectionate fun. And Molly would probably pay a little too much attention to his neck, and in a little while, the man would wake up feeling a bit light headed, with a hazy and entirely non-specific memory of having had an excellent time.

Because Molly was nothing if not courteous.

Some time later, he was exiting the alley, absently wiping blood off his mouth with the back of his hand, when he happened to glance across the street and lock eyes with a woman standing there. He froze, his hand still at his mouth. She was staring straight at him with the unfriendliest expression he'd ever seen. She was about his height, he thought, with skin that wasn't quite as dark as his own and brown hair in an undercut, and ripped as _ fuck _. She was wearing torn jeans and what looked like a tank top proclaiming 'Sleeves are bullshit', with a blue windbreaker over it.

Molly's eyes lit up, and he lowered his hand. "Beau~!"

There was some recognition there, but her expression went from unfriendly to downright hostile and her eyes visibly dropped from his face to a point lower down. Instinctively, he glanced down as well, and saw a small spot of blood on the collar of his lavender silk shirt where it had dripped down the side of his face. Then he looked back up at her, and his smile vanished as something clicked. Oh. Oh _ no _.

She didn't recognize _ him _.

She recognized what he _ was _.

And _ now _ he realized what was wrong with her stance, just as her hand snapped behind her back, reaching for something tucked into her belt.

Why, _ oh why _ , in the infinite number of possible worlds they could be dealing with, did _ this one _ have to be the one where the Cobalt Reserve was a hunters' guild? "...Shit."

Mona and Yuli were bound to be in the same neighborhood, it was the only popular bar on this end of town. And he absolutely did not want this to come to a head in the street for a lot of reasons. So he did the only thing he could do in this situation. 

He ran.


	3. Darkling

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yasha follows an intriguing scent to a friend and promises are made.

_ Most people think the Fae are merely myths and legends, but as is so often the case, there is truth behind the mythology. The Fae existed once and exist still, though in a drastically altered manner. Due to an incident of largely unknown but arcane and catastrophic nature, some of the Fae were driven back to their realm beyond the mortal world. These True Fae, as they have been called, are the Fae that persist in legendry passed down through oral tradition, the Fae of the original faerie stories- the entities of infinite power and caprice, who are cruel because they do not know the meaning of kindness. It is the True Fae who steal mortals away in the night and spirit them away to their eternal realm for reasons known only to them. Sometimes, not often, but just enough for it to be known, these mortals manage to flee the realm of the Fae, and return to the mortal world- though they are always irrevocably changed by the experience... _

\- BE, "World of Darkness: Essays on the Supernatural"

* * *

Yasha padded quietly along a deserted alley, occasionally stopping to sniff the air. She'd lost track of what city she was in, as the names seldom meant anything to her. It was easier to get by in wolf form, most of the time; sleeping outside wasn't bad at all when she had a thick layer of fur to keep her warm, and being able to hunt her own meals and eat them raw meant that the very little money Molly was able to give her stretched a lot further. There were a few things she needed to be in human form to do, like ask questions or get into certain places, but overall, she preferred her four-legged shape. It was just... _ easier. _ And less complicated. And truth be known, while either shape tended to attract notice, animal control was easier to ditch than the police when they decided that the six foot four woman who looked like a homeless Visigoth was a suspicious person.

Though there _ had _ been that time she spent an entire weekend stuck in a wildlife rehab center after a well-meaning park ranger had managed to tranquilize her. To be fair, the only reason the ranger had been able to corner Yasha was because she 'd had an enormous Newfie, big enough to give even Yasha second thoughts. Molly had laughed himself sick when she'd told him, then went and bought her a thick leather dog collar to wear. It did admittedly spare her some annoyance, and Molly nobly refrained from any lascivious comments.

Being in wolf form also meant that people tended to object less to her presence when she loitered around, quietly listening for anything interesting. A human hanging around inexplicably, especially a human who looked like she did, made people nervous if not outright angry... but what looked like a big dog was just a big dog to them, and she felt some degree of resigned amusement at the fact that the same people who would threaten to have her arrested for trespassing when she was in a form that could talk back would often rub and scratch behind her ears and leave water and sometimes even food out for her when she _wasn't_. But it was less trouble all around, and it made it easier to try to catch hints of where she might find who she was looking for.

Bars were often the best place to hang around, for the type of people she was looking for; or at least, that seemed the most likely. They shared only a handful of characteristics, but unhealthy coping mechanisms involving alcohol was one of them. So she waited, and watched, and listened, sometimes for as much as a week before moving on to check the next bar. And then when she'd exhausted all the bars, she'd leave the city for the next one.

She'd had no luck thus far.

But tonight, she'd caught a scent that had attracted her notice. She wasn't sure what it was, or if it was who she was looking for, but it was strange enough that it warranted some looking into regardless. It was a strange combination of dirt, metal, chemicals, and decay, strongly overlaid by Other. That's what caught her attention; Other was rare, and even if it _wasn't_ connected to what she was looking for, she could bear to know more about it.

So Yasha was quietly slipping through the back alleys, following the strange scent as it had left the bar and meandered through the less frequented streets. She wasn't particularly sure where the scent trail was leading her, but it seemed to be heading towards the edge of town. That was another benefit of staying in wolf form. Her nose was still sharper than a normal human's even in her human form, but there were a lot of nuances that only a canine nose could catch.

Then there was a second scent that she picked up, and Yasha stopped. This was almost Other too, but in a fundamentally different way. It reminded her of green and growing things, of a wilderness that never had and never would be tamed. There was something wild and primal about it, wilder and more primal than her pack had been. Wilder and more primal than any pack that had never set paw in human civilization. And just barely detectable under the scent of Other was a whiff of charcoal and sweet-smelling smoke.

The scent wasn't strong enough to belong to anything of more than moderate size, and she looked around curiously. The wind shifted slightly, and she sneezed. When she did, the Other smell vanished entirely, and all she could smell was cat. There was a soft meow at the mouth of an intersecting alley, and when Yasha looked, a small house cat was sitting there, tail curled around its feet, watching her curiously and grooming one ear with a paw.

She had encountered domestic pets before, with mixed results. Most dogs were respectful of her, some friendlier than others but all inclined to treat her with caution at least at first. Cats tended to be more wary and keep their distance, though sometimes they were just as likely to puff up and hiss as they were to make nice. She had never seen a cat behave so nonchalantly when she was close by.

It was curious.

She studied the cat for some minutes, and the cat seemed to be studying her. There was something about it that seemed... almost familiar. After a moment, she shifted into human form, and the world narrowed around her, colors blooming and sharpening in the cloudy afternoon light. She could make out the details on the cat's coat now, orange fur with darker stripes. The cat blinked at her slowly, and meowed, but seemed to take her shift in stride. Yasha hesitantly knelt down, and tapped the pavement with a softly encouraging noise. The cat stretched, then got up and came over to her, rubbing against her legs and pushing at her in a way that needed no translation.

She gently picked the cat up, then stood up with it in her arms. It kneaded against her contentedly, then settled into a small loaf against her chest, purring.

_ "Oh. It's... it's making a _ sound _ ." _

_ "Ja. That means he is happy." _

Yasha bit her lip, thinking as she absently scratched it gently behind the ears. No collar, and there were a _lot_ of orange tabbies in the world, pets and strays alike, but- After a moment, she nodded to herself, and gently put the cat back down. "I'll follow you," she said softly. "Wherever you want to lead me."

The cat stretched and yawned, then started off down the cross-alley Yasha had noticed at a leisurely pace, and she obligingly followed. The cat was threading a maze of alleys and back streets that Yasha had no idea even existed, and while she was confident she could have found her way back out to the street if she got lost, the cat wasn't moving faster than a human's walking pace and seemed to know where it was going. Presently, it stopped and sat down near what looked like the back of some sort of shop in a dingy, trash littered alley. There was only the back door of that shop and a high window that opened on the alley, but the window was slightly ajar, and Yasha absolutely did not feel like dealing with with a suspicious employee calling the police on her. Since this seemed to be the cat's destination, and it hadn't minded before, she shifted back to wolf form and curled up near the mouth of the alley. The cat promptly moved, lightly jumping up on her back to curl up there, purring.

That did tend to confirm her assumptions.

They sat there like that for probably some fifteen or twenty minutes, Yasha's head resting on her forepaws and the cat apparently dozing, when there was a soft noise, and the window of the shop slid open further. The old, warped frame of the window sash creaked once, and Yasha looked up just in time to hear a faint curse, and a silence that suggested someone holding their breath. But after a few moments, when nothing happened, it started moving again, and now that she was looking Yasha could see a small, almost clawed hand lifting it from the inside.

The smell she'd noticed back at the bar, the scent of Other and chemicals, drifted out of the window as a small, misshapen form wriggled out of it, clutching a worn backpack. "Frumpkin?" the person whispered, in a tiny, scratchy voice that only careful listening and some idea of what to expect could identify as female. "Frumpkin, it's time to go." The woman dropped lightly to the ground, then snapped her fingers in a peculiar way. Immediately, the window slid closed again with a faint clatter. She made another motion, and the lock on the inside of the window clicked shut.

The tiny woman turned around with her bag held close to her chest, then froze with a startled squeak when she saw Yasha. "A-aah! Uh... n-nice... d-doggy..." She pressed against the opposite wall, edging away from Yasha. It was hard to tell what she looked like; she was wearing a ratty, oversized gray hoodie and baggy pants that concealed nearly her whole body, and all Yasha could really see were bright yellow eyes and unkempt, coarse black hair under the hood. Her hands were covered by the long sleeves of her hoodie.

Yasha just watched her calmly and stayed where she was. No sense in crowding Nott- and who else could it be?- when she was already frightened. On her back, Frumpkin lazily stretched, headbutted Yasha affectionately, then went to twine around Nott's ankles. Nott's gaze visibly jumped between the big wolf and the cat, then she gingerly slung the backpack over one shoulder, and bent down to pick the cat up and hold him close to her chest, all without taking her eyes off of Yasha. She was terrified, Yasha could smell it, but she didn't think it was just because of her size. It often wasn't obvious, but Nott was quite shrewd in her own way...

Nott was fidgeting again, yellow gaze flicking from Yasha to the backstreet beyond to the shadowed corner of the alley they were already in and back again. "I'll... just b-be... on m-my... w-way..." She took a step towards the mouth of the alley, and Yasha's ears pricked up. Nott hesitated, then a sort of fatalistic defiance entered her manner. She moved suddenly, nearly jumping back into the wall of the building behind her. As she did, the shadow it cast seemed to explode outward and wrap around her and Frumpkin, and she vanished.

Yasha was considerably surprised, and immediately got up to sniff curiously at the place Nott had been. Her smell was still strong. That suggested she hadn't gone, had just concealed herself. Knowing Nott, probably the idea was to make it look as if she had gone, so that Yasha would go looking for her and leave her to make her escape. She sat down and scratched behind her ear thoughtfully, then looked around the alley. Nott had used the shadows to disappear, and instinct said she could only go where the shadow did. The angle of the sun meant that the shadow Nott had melted into didn't cross the street, but was angled further into the alley, and there was a deeply shadowed corner at the other end, where another brick wall blocked it off. In fact, it looked like the shadows were darker there than they had been previously.

Yasha scratched behind her ear again, then came to a decision. She shifted back to human form, and was rewarded by a nearly imperceptible rippling of the shadows in the corner. She didn't move to approach it, though. She just sat down on the ground in the sun, her back to the building opposite the one Nott had emerged from. She didn't say anything at first, patiently sorting through words to seem as non-threatening as possible. At no point did she look directly at the shadowed corner. "...I'm not going to hurt you," she said softly. "I know you probably don't remember me. That's okay. I just want to talk to you. I'll stay here, and you can stay there. My name is Yasha. Your name is Nott the Brave, or at least, that’s the name we know you by." There was another faint ripple that she almost missed even though she was watching for it out of the corner of her eye. "We're sort of friends, in another world. You gave me flowers to put in my book, and sometimes we picked flowers together. You had a magic flask that never ran out." She paused again. She wasn't very _ good _ at talking to people, and she had to be careful here or she'd scare Nott even more. "Knowing you, you probably don't trust me. I don't know if you think that I'm out to trap you or something else. But Frumpkin led me here, and I don't think he would have done that if I meant you harm." Something occurred to her, and she ventured a cautious addition. "I'm not going to ask about… well, I won’t ask things you don’t want to answer."

There was a faint movement at the back of the alley, and Yasha could just make out the top of Nott's head behind a trash can in her peripheral vision. She was quiet for almost a minute. Then, very deliberately and still without looking at Nott, she said, "I am not a spy sent from Xhorhas to kill you all in your sleep."

The resulting silence felt too long, but presently, Nott broke it. "...That's just what a spy from Xhorhas _ would _ say."

_ Now _ Yasha looked up at Nott hopefully. She was cautiously emerging from behind the trash can, and Frumpkin trotted out and promptly went over to Yasha to curl up in her lap. That seemed to satisfy Nott, and she came out, settling against the same wall Yasha was leaning against, though a few feet away and in the shadow of the building, holding her backpack like a stuffed animal in front of her. "...I didn't know who you were," Nott said after a moment.

"I know. Do you remember now?"

"Most of it." She pulled a flask out of the pocket of her hoodie, and took a big gulp. "Are... are any of the others with you?"

"No. Molly's awake, but he's not with me." She glanced over at the other woman. "Is… Because Frumpkin..." That suggested that he was, but it wasn't certain. And it was always so much _ harder _ to find him if he wasn't already with Nott.

"Caleb... he's resting right now," Nott said, avoiding Yasha's gaze. "We knew each other, I mean, we knew that we had _ known _ each other or were _ supposed _ to know each other, we knew it was important, but we didn't know _ why _. Neither of us could remember that part. We thought it was something from Before."

Yasha raised an eyebrow. "Before?"

Nott hesitated, then pushed her hood back. She didn't look like a goblin, exactly, but Yasha could see how the comparison would be easy to make. She looked too thin and too small, all the angles of her face too sharp, and her skin was greyed and withered in a vaguely unnatural way. Her hair was unhealthy looking in a way that suggested a wire brush, and her teeth were just slightly too sharp. Her hands were malformed claws. Her eyes were the same though, bright, almost luminous yellow with slitted pupils. "I was... something _ happened _," she said after a moment, though her tone indicated she didn't want to say more than that. "And after it happened, well, I wasn't the same. I can look normal, for a little while, if I put effort into it, but it's hard. It's easier to disappear." She took another swig from her flask. "He.. things happened to him too. We didn't meet in jail, but... it wasn't much different."

Yasha considered that, and Nott's tone, and the way their luck tended to run. "...Is he okay? I mean, does he need help?"

"...It's... complicated," Nott said hesitantly. "I can come and go as I please, they can't really _ stop _ me, at least, not without putting out more effort than they think it's worth. But he won’t- or _ can’t _ \- it's _ complicated _ . I can't leave him there _ alone _. I can run errands for him during the day, he's safe then, but..." she trailed off.

Yasha hummed thoughtfully, petting Frumpkin. "...I'm very strong."

"...I know. But I don't know if you're strong _enough_. By yourself, I mean. There's a _ lot _ of them. And... and I don't know if he'd _ recognize _ you. And I don't know how much difference it would make if he did."

"Then we'll find the others. We'll get him back."

Nott drained her flask moodily. "We have to. It’s not good for him to stay there, he's..." She went silent. "Have you found Beau yet?"

"You're the first one I've found besides Molly." Though the more of them that woke up, the easier it tended to get to run into others.

She tucked the flask back into her hoodie. "I can't- I have to stay to look after him. And if I'm away too long, it'll be... not great." She sighed. "But if you find Beau, when she wakes up, tell her that he didn't get away in this world. He _ tried _ , but he didn't make it. They _ caught _ him. She should understand what that means."

"Okay." Yasha glanced over at her. "Nott." The other woman jumped slightly, out of nervous habit. "Are you going to be safe?"

Nott pulled her hood up and hid behind her knees. "Safe enough. From them, anyway. As long as he is. They think I'm his ghoul, and he can get pretty territorial about what he thinks of as his."

And Yasha didn't doubt that he would respond in a _ highly _ unpleasant way if anyone so much as threatened Nott. That was one thing that never changed and probably never would. "Okay." She went quiet again. "Do you have a phone?"

Nott nodded. "I do. But you can't call it at night. They don't know I have it. Most of them don't really _ believe _ in them, and it can _ stay _ that way."

"Let me have the number." Nott pulled a scrap of paper out of her backpack and produced a pen from somewhere, then wrote the number out for her. Yasha took it, and carefully folded the paper up and secured it under the buckle of her collar. Molly could show her how to put it in her phone- a simple prepaid affair he'd gotten at the same time as his own- when she saw him. "I don't remember the number on my phone, but you can call Molly's if you need help," she said, and carefully recited the number she'd gotten from Molly.

"Okay." Nott scribbled it down and stuffed it back into her bag. "...I've got to get back. It'll be dark soon." She glanced over at Yasha, fidgeting with the ragged sleeve of her hoodie. "I'm glad Frumpkin found you," she blurted out suddenly.

"So am I," she said quietly. "We'll get him back."

"...Thank you, Yasha."

* * *

Nott got back to the old mansion on the outside of town not long after the sun set. She slipped in the same way she had gotten out, through the kitchen window. The house was quiet, and she was almost positive she'd gotten back before anyone woke up. So she started softly making her way to the cellar. The lesser members of the clan had been assigned rooms upstairs, but those with more status- including her boy- had been given quarters in the cellar, safely out of reach of the sun. She just wanted to get to his library so she could show him what she'd made off with from the pawn shop and the bookstore when he woke up. And maybe tell him about Yasha- no, that wouldn't do, he wouldn't know who she _ was _, and Nott didn't think she could manage to properly wake him up. And she loved him dearly, but sometimes his judgement wasn't to be trusted right now. They could explain once the others had managed to get him out of this fix.

She'd just made it to the cellar door when a floorboard creaked behind her, and she whipped around. "Gone shopping, have you, _ Kleine_?" The tall blonde was leaning against the door to the billiard room, absently filing her nails and eying Nott with a cold, appraising look. "More books for your master?"

"The... the bookstore closes before the sun goes down, ma’am," Nott said, looking down. Oh, how she _ hated _ her. There was a crack of billiard balls in the room behind her followed by a comment she couldn’t quite make out about vermin, and she could smell a cigar. She hated _ him _ too. And of all the nights for them to wake up early... She wanted nothing more than to tear the lids off their resting places during the day while they slept and stick something sharp and pointy in them... but even if she had been strong enough, they were too smart. They thought she was under control, bound to Caleb’s will, but wisely, they still didn't trust her. They'd nailed thin sheets of iron over the lids, and she couldn't touch them. So it was better that she played the subservient minion, at least until she could do something about it. "And there... there was a new one he hasn't read yet."

The blonde laughed, and Nott winced at how cruel it sounded. "Of course, of course. He always _ was _ one for books. And I'm sure he'll find something to do with the trinkets you've pilfered." Nott barely restrained a snarl. She examined her nails, then glanced at Nott again with a predatory smile. "And did you bring me something pretty, _ Kleine_?"

Inwardly, Nott seethed. The woman liked to remind her of her place in this house, and the threats were all in the subtext. It was base _ extortion_, was what it was, but it would only cause trouble to tell Caleb. He could get away with terrorizing the lower ranking members of the clan when he had to, hell, it was _ expected_, but these two were different. And Nott wouldn't put Caleb in that position, even if it meant she had to swallow her pride and take their backhanded insults and appease _ that bitch _ with tribute. With hands that only shook a little bit (and even _she_ didn't know if it was rage or fear), she pulled an elegantly, almost teardrop shaped glass bottle with a faint golden tint out of her backpack. The neck of the bottle was wrapped in gold wire and topped with a glass bubble, and it was filled with a gold-colored liquid. She offered it up with a timidity that was only partially feigned.

She took the bottle, pulled the wire wrapped lid off, and pressed the spray nozzle. Obligingly, it released a cloud of floral perfume, and she smelled it appraisingly. "Dior, isn't it, _ Klein_? You are _ astonishingly _ well educated for such a twisted little wretch." She smiled, and patted Nott's head with an approximation of fond affection. Terrifying or _ not _ , she almost lost her hand at the wrist for it. "_Gutes Mädchen_. Now. Run along and give _ meine Liebe _ his new books."

Nott made a heroic effort, and managed to repress the hiss. _ He's not your love, _ she thought. _ You don't love anything and I don't know if you ever did even Before. He's _ ** _my_ ** _ boy. _ ** _I_ ** _ protect _ ** _him_**_. You can have your way for now. But only for now. _ She jerked open the cellar door and started down the stairs, Frumpkin appearing at her heels from wherever he'd been hiding during the conversation. _ Just you wait, _ ** _Miss_ ** _ Astrid. Now I know we have friends out there, and sooner or later they're going to come for us, and we’re going to wreck your shit. _

* * *

It was almost midnight when Yasha called Molly's phone. It had taken her a while to get back to the bus locker she'd stashed her few possessions in; she had never carried much, had never really needed to as a wolf. But now that she knew who she was and was on a mission, it was better to have a way of contacting at least Molly, and sometimes she needed money for things. And just to make herself feel better, she'd started collecting flowers again. Molly had even found her a hardback book on etiquette somewhere, she had no idea where, but she’d almost cried when he'd given to her.

And even if it hadn't taken her time to get back, he wouldn't have been up before sundown, and then he liked to do a little prowling and find a good mark to feed on. But by this time of night, he should be done and just fucking around, and that was the best time to call. She needed to let him know about Nott, and that it sounded like they needed to mount a rescue.

It rang a couple more times than it usually did, and when it picked up, there was something going on in the background that she couldn't quite make sense of.

"Molly, I fo-"

He cut her off, and his voice sounded oddly distant, like he was trying to use speaker phone but had forgotten to turn it on. "_YashaI'llcallyoubackI'mtryingtorestrainBeau- SHIT!_" Then there was a terrific clatter, and the line went dead.

Yasha stared at the phone for a moment. "...oh no." She haphazardly shoved the phone in her crude satchel, slung it over her back where it wouldn't get in the way when she shifted. Then she ran.


	4. Reckoner

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Beau confronts Molly. No one is really happy with this.

_ As long as there have been monsters in the world, there have been those that have made it their mission to hunt those monsters. Sometimes they are loners set on this path for reasons of vengeance or because they want to keep their loved ones safe, using whatever tricks they have picked up through their own experience and study. Sometimes there are organized guilds that have a larger focus and better- or at least more codified- training. In theory, such hunters are a needed defense against the creatures of darkness that can intrude on the mortal world. In practice, however, things are seldom so black and white as the hunters would have you believe, and the line between monster and man is sometimes so thin as to be nonexistent. Hunters provide a necessary function, it is true, but sometimes, they turn their ire on the wrong targets. _

\- BE, "World of Darkness: Essays on the Supernatural"

* * *

If there was a silver lining at all to _ any _ of this mess, it was that Beau was basically the only one who couldn't fuck him up from a distance. Of course, if she _ did _ get her hands on him before he figured out how to get her listen to reason, they'd need a resurrection they probably couldn't get here... assuming there was anything _ left _ of him to raise.

Molly was staying ahead of her, if only just, cutting through alleys and taking turns at random. He didn't waste time looking behind him, but periodically, he could hear her swear as she crashed into something and once she'd let loose with a vehement 'FUCK!' as she slid over the hood of a car that nearly clipped her. But _ godsdamn_, that woman was stubborn as all hell. And if she didn't have some sort of endurance supplement endorsement, she was getting fucking _ cheated _.

He never could have kept this up if he'd still been alive.

He got lucky, and managed to duck into the door of what seemed to be an abandoned warehouse while Beau was trying to shove her way through a sudden crowd of pedestrians. It wouldn't take her long to figure out where he'd gone, but hopefully it would be long enough to do some good. Molly lurked in the shadows of the warehouse, eyeing the door he'd entered through, and pulled his phone out. One could hope his shitty prepaid flip phone would have reception here... 'Pick up... pick up..." The line buzzed in his ear. Fortunately, luck was with him, at least to this extent. "Pick- There you are. Listen, you two need to get back to the carnival right now and lay low. ... There's a hunter in town, and she made me. I pulled her downtown, so there's- ... No, you just get back and keep your heads down. ... Don't argue with me, Yuli, you know that the smart ones travel in packs, and I don't think this one's a dumbass." Not that he'd ever _ tell _ her that. "I'm going to take her on a wild goose chase, it'll be easier if she's focusing on me. ... Have you forgotten who you're talking to, darling? I can lose her easy enough when I need to." He left out the part that he didn't _ want _ to lose her just yet. In three months, she was the first one either he or Yasha had caught up with, and it was sheer dumb luck. "Yeah. We might need to pull up stakes pretty quick and blow town. ... I'll get back as soon as I can. If I can't make it back before sunrise I'll find some place to go to ground, don't worry about me." He eyed the door nervously. He'd have thought Beau would have caught on to where he'd ducked into by now... "Yes, my love. For you, I'll text with this horrifying byzantine keypad. Now scoot and watch your backs."

He snapped his phone shut as the call ended and shoved it back in his pocket, taking a deep breath. As long as they showed some sense, the twins would get back all right... and Gustav had always been better at keeping a low profile than all three of them.

Not that Molly had ever really known what a low profile was. In this or any other world.

Now that he'd taken care of his clan, all that left was trying to figure out what the hell to do with Beau. Yasha probably would have been able to get through to her better than Molly would have, but Yasha wasn't here... He tipped his head against the wall behind him and shut his eyes, thinking.

It was only the faintest of sounds that warned him, and his eyes snapped open and he jerked to the side just in time to avoid getting his face smashed in by Beau's fist. "Fucking hell!" Stupid of him, _ so fucking stupid_. Beau wasn't an idiot. She'd figured out where he'd gone, then found another entrance, and gotten up into the catwalks above him. And he'd forgotten that Beau was crass and loud and delightfully unsubtle...

Entirely by choice.

She'd damn near come down directly on his head.

The blow he'd dodged had left a significant hole in the sheetrock wall behind him. Beau cursed at the miss, and her other fist lashed out and caught him in the side. His breath whuffed out and something felt like it snapped. He could heal it in time, but- "Jesus fuck, Beau! This is rude even for you!"

"Don't know how you know my name, bloodsucker, don't really care. I'm still gonna dust you," she snarled.

..._ Yep. _ That was Beau.

"Now calm down, we can talk about this-" He tried to slip out of the cornered position she'd gotten him in, but she grabbed his shirt and jerked him back.

"Oh, fuck you!"

"Fuck you too, Beau!" She blinked, and for a moment, he wondered if he'd gotten through to her. Then she just snarled again, pulling a long wooden stake out from where it had been tucked into her belt. "Oh godsdammit," Molly said, struggling a bit more. He really didn't want to get into an active fight with her... for one he was pretty sure she'd fuck him up even if she _ didn't _ win, but he also didn't want to hurt her if he didn't have to. "What in the Nine Hells do the others _ do _ to wake you up?!"

"Yeah, your mind games are shit, asshole." He jerked away from her again, willing to sustain the loss of his favorite shirt at this point, but she'd always been tougher than him, and she slammed him into the wall again. She pinned him in place with one arm, flipping the stake around in her other hand.

Fuck. This was a lot more serious than he wanted it to be right now. If he didn't do something _ now _ to take control of this situation, one of them was going to _ die_. Either she'd put a stake through his heart or he'd fight back out of instinct and that would be just about as bad. And while he had some nasty tricks up his sleeve... well, she'd probably be prepared for those if she'd been a hunter for any appreciable amount of time.

The problem was the only other option he _ had _ was a bit risky and didn't always work. Didn't _ usually _ work, to be frank. And maybe it wouldn't have worked this time either if he hadn't _ needed _ it to right now, or if this wasn't Beau. Molly had long ago stopped questioning the whims of fate, though he did curse them from time to time.

It didn't really matter why it worked. He bit his lip hard enough that one of his fangs went straight through, and as the blood trickled sluggishly out of the puncture, Beau's eyes went black and blood trickled down her face.

"What the FUCK?!" She yelped and automatically released him and dropped the stake, half-clawing at her eyes. He didn't waste the opportunity. As soon as her grip loosened, he surged forward and body-checked her. The impact shoved her back a good three feet, and he slipped around her, darting out of her reach. She wiped the blood out of her eyes as the momentary blindness faded, and whirled at him. "Motherfucker," she snapped, lunging after him again.

This wasn't so bad, her fists were terrifying but as long as he could stay out of her reach, he'd be fine. At least she didn't have a weap-

Just as he was having that thought, she yanked a short, squat metal cylinder out of her pocket, flicked a latch on the top, then tossed it up in the air. Almost instantaneously, both ends shot out, and she caught what appeared to be a lightweight, six foot aluminum staff.

Oh. _ Of course _ she had something like that.

"Fuck my liiiiiiiiiiife," he hissed as he bolted.

This wasn't working. As long as she had the upper hand, this was not _ going _ to work. She'd never been one to hesitate much in combat, and right now, she had no reason to listen to him. He was going to have to find some way to get the drop on her, make her sit still long enough to recognize him... or at least decide not to murder him before they could get to someone she _ would _ recognize.

So that meant he got to play Death Hide and Seek. Fun.

He kicked himself for a brief moment for never bothering to work out some sort of routine with the twins; acrobatics would have helped immensely right now. And because he'd come into town expecting nothing more than a trip to the bar, a meal, and maybe a quick tryst in the supply closet, he didn't have any weapons of his own on him, not even shitty prop swords. Well, he'd made do before. 

A plan was beginning to form for how he was going to handle this. Only the barest bones of a plan, and obviously it was entirely possible that it would blow up in his face the moment Beau took him by surprise. But then, even though his memory was very patchy regarding some things, he was pretty sure that plans had never really been their strong suit anyway.

But for now, he was darting through the warehouse, looking for a good ambush point. Not the most obvious one- Beau would spot it too- but the second or third most obvious. He didn't know what had been stored here, but there were still some shelves that could provide cover, and what looked like some offices or something. He thought about one of the internal rooms, but dismissed it quickly... though there was a shelf nearby that could be promising...

He'd given her the slip for the moment, but it was only a matter of seconds before Beau caught up to him. She was taking it slower than she had in the street, probably because she was using more caution than he was used to in a space where there were more places for him to hide. His real advantage right now was that he knew more or less how she worked, but until she woke up, all Beau had to go on was what she'd seen tonight... and he hadn't exactly put on the best showing. She could very well underestimate him. So after the briefest hesitation, he scrambled up the shelf to crouch on top of it, out of immediate sight and above Beau's eyeline.

He was just in time, because he'd just barely situated himself as Beau rounded the corner, occasionally twirling her staff in one hand. Her eyes snapped back and forth, professionally checking her surroundings for danger. But it never occurred to her to look up. She paused, and carefully used her staff to nudge the door of the interior room he'd considered and rejected open. When nothing happened, she pushed it open more fully, then cautiously took a step in, looking around.

It was now or never; he'd never get a better chance.

He wasn't entirely sure if he'd somehow managed to make his move more soundlessly than Beau had when she’d jumped him, or if his senses were just that much sharper than hers. Either way, he managed to take her completely unawares when he pounced. He hit her hard squarely in the back, taking her to the floor and damn near braining himself on the top of the doorframe in the process. They landed in a heap, with Beau pinned under his weight, face down on the floor.

"Fuck!" Beau struggled, trying to either dislodge him or turn over where she could hit him. "Get off me, bloodsucker!"

"Now that's not a nice way to ask," Molly said, and managed to grab her flailing arms and pin them behind her back. "Will you just fucking _listen_ for two minutes, unpleasant one?"

There was a momentary pause at the nickname. Then she snarled at him. "There's nothing you have to say worth listening to." She bucked and thrashed, nearly throwing him off despite his knee in her back. He suddenly found it much harder to keep her pinned, and nearly lost his grip on her hands. What he wouldn't give for a tail right now.

Of course, his phone _ would _ choose that moment to ring.

The only reason he answered it at all was because it was Yasha's special ringtone, the one that sounded like bells and some sort of choral hymn. He shifted slightly, managing to get both of Beau’s hands in one of his and digging his other knee into her spine as he somehow pulled his phone out of his pocket without losing his grip on her. He couldn't _ not _ answer, not if it was Yasha... and anyway she could probably stand to know about this development.

Not that he was going to _ convey _ much. He didn't bring the phone up to his ear, just flipped it open to answer the call. Over the tinny speaker, he could hear Yasha start to say something.

_ "Molly, I fo-" _

"YashaI'llcallyoubackI'mtryingtorestrainBeau- SHIT!" Beau jerked suddenly, wrenching one of her hands free and knocking his phone across the room, where it snapped shut. He tried to grab her wrist again, but she got away from him, and the shift of his weight as he reached for her hand gave her more leverage. She flung him off somehow and knocked him into a wall, and got to her feet half a second before he could.

That half a second made the difference.

He'd just gotten to his feet when Beau hit him like a runaway truck, slamming him into the wall. He was taller than her but she was pure muscle and it didn't really matter. And Beau had learned from the first time. She wasn't going to give him a chance to do anything now. Before he could try anything or even try to pull away, there was a heavy impact in the middle of his torso and he hissed involuntarily, showing his fangs as the pain hit.

With some difficulty, he looked down at the stake protruding from his chest, still in Beau's hand. As he looked back up, he could feel blood starting to trickle out of his mouth. She was very close, still holding him against the wall with the full weight of her body. She was close enough that he could see the sudden recognition spark in her eyes. Her triumphant smirk vanished like a switch had been thrown, and she looked down too with a slowly dawning expression of horror. "Oh _ fuck_," she whispered.

Her hand was still wrapped around the stake planted in Molly's chest, covered with his blood.

"_N__ow _ you wake up..." Molly managed, more blood running out of his mouth.

"Oh _ fuck_, Molly, I'm sorry, I didn't- fuck," Beau said, letting go of the stake and trying to put pressure on the wound. It was still bleeding, and at least half of the length of the stake was in his chest. It would have been enough to kill a normal man.

He reached up with a shaking hand and grabbed her jacket, getting her attention. "Either your... anatomy... or your aim... is shit, and I... am eternally grateful." Beau looked down. While it was very clearly a devastating wound, she'd hit a lot lower than she'd meant to. The stake was planted firmly near the base of his sternum. Just about the spot where- NOPE. _Nope_. Not thinking of that, she wasn’t _going_ there. "You missed."

"Oh thank _ fuck_. Are you- should I-"

He shook his head. "Pull... pull it out. I can't... bleed to death... but I can't... regenerate it... with it still in there."

"Okay okay okay," she said, forcing the panic away. She didn't _ have _ panic attacks, she could _ deal _ with this. She hadn't _ killed _ him. She grabbed the stake again and yanked it out, and Molly snarled in pain. She pressed her hand against the wound again as it spurted blood. "I really wish you had that damn necklace right about now..." He made a noise that was supposed to be a laugh, but it sounded way too feral.

Beau froze.

"_Beau,_" Molly said, and there was something wrong with his voice, it had that same sort of dark edge she now associated with Infernal. She looked up again, and even as she watched, his eyes were filming over with blood. "_Beau, get away from me._"

Oh _ fuck_. She scrambled backwards, leaving him pressed up against the wall with his eyes screwed shut. Fuck fuck fuck fuck. She'd forgotten, and he... hell, he might not have even _ known. _Fuuuuuuuuuuuck.

There were a lot of reasons hunters were taught you had to be damn sure of your aim when you staked a vampire. The most _ obvious _ was that if you didn't kill on the first hit, the vampire could get away and then would have personal reason to fuck you up. But that wasn't the most _ important _ reason.

She had just remembered that vampires could frenzy when they lost a lot of blood suddenly.

Molly stayed where he was, his fists clenched and shaking slightly as he visibly wrestled with the beast inside of him, struggling to maintain control of himself and his hunger.

He was a stubborn motherfucker. Almost as stubborn as she was. He might have actually managed it if they hadn't been interrupted.

"Beauregard! There you are! Did you-" Zeenoth, her current babysitter (of _ course _ it was fucking Zeenoth, trying to keep tabs on her for the Cobalt Soul) burst into the room and immediately stopped as he caught sight of Molly. And as was pretty much the norm for the pompous asshole, his timing couldn't have been worse.

She didn't really care that much about Zeenoth getting himself fucked up, especially by his own carelessness. What she _ did _ care about was that it would be _ Molly_, not her, that fucked him up this time. "Zeenoth! Don't-"

Molly opened his eyes and glared across the room at Zeenoth with a feral, savage look that was entirely wrong on him. His eyes were totally red and full of blood. He hissed and his whole fucking jaw seemed to unhinge as he bared his fangs. Then, before Beau could do anything about it, he'd crossed the room so fast he seemed to have simply blinked across the intervening distance and was on the other man. He grabbed Zeenoth and shoved him against the wall much the same way that Beau had done to him earlier, except even as Zeenoth hit the wall, Molly's fangs were already buried in his throat.

And to be fair to him, Zeenoth tried to fight back. _ Tried _ of course being the operative word. But Zeenoth was a glorified desk monkey who'd passed just enough basic combat training to be allowed in the field to supervise Beau as long as she took point, and he was no match for a frenzied, starving-crazed vampire.

"Fuck!" Beau darted forward. The Molly she remembered didn't have any particular objection to killing an asshole if they deserved it, but he'd mind killing someone _ this _ way very much when he was in his right mind. And honestly, so would she, even if Zeenoth _ was _ an unbearable ass.

She hit Molly hard from behind, delivering a snap punch to the back of his head that made him jerk back, whipping around to snarl at her in a way that was really _ goddamn terrifying_. But it meant that he'd stopped chewing on Zeenoth's jugular, and that's what she wanted right now. She managed to get her staff around his neck and pulled, yanking him away from the other man and towards her chest. This was a dangerous position to be in, with him out of control like this, but as long as she could keep him pressed against her but facing away, she'd be okay. And if she couldn't... well, she could probably tank it better than Zeenoth could. Especially since he'd kind of hit the floor like a sack of potatoes once Molly let go of him to claw at her hands and the staff pressed against his neck.

"Come on, Molly, this isn't you!" Beau had unbalanced Molly when she pulled him away, and since she'd pulled him against her, that meant he was unbalancing _ her_, and they both staggered back several steps. Molly was thrashing, trying to get out of her grip, and she was trying to keep him under control, and so far, neither one of them really had the upper hand. "Fight it, you obnoxious asshole!"

A wordless, guttural snarl was the only answer she got. "Fuck!" She glanced around, then dragged Molly towards the door. She twisted at the last moment, and managed to wedge one end of her staff against the doorframe. Then she shifted her weight, keeping Molly trapped between the staff and herself, and let go of the wedged end of the staff. "Fuck I hope this works-" Before he could take advantage of the more precarious position and twist on her, she'd doubled up her fist and driven it into his side as hard as she could.

She hadn't used Stunning Fist in a while, and not at all in this world, but she must have remembered how to do it right, because Molly suddenly locked up against her, then sagged. And a few seconds later, he shook his head dazedly. "Beau?"

"You with me, asshole?"

"Y-yeah. Yeah. I think I'm good now. Instincts are a bitch, you know?"

She nodded, and stepped back, steadying him as she released him. "Yeah, I kinda got that."

He leaned against the doorframe, breathing a little harshly. "...Did I kill him?"

Beau shook her head. "I pulled you off in time. He's still gonna need a doctor, I think, but you didn't do anything we couldn't fix."

"Good. ... Thanks."

Beau leaned against the wall and slid down to the floor. "...This one's gonna suck, isn't it?"

Molly snorted mirthlessly. "You almost killed a friend and then had to punch the murder out of him, Yasha found a body dump in a field, and I _ got _ body dumped in a field. I think this one _ already _ sucks."

"Yasha's awake?" Beau raised an eyebrow hopefully. "Is she with you?" Before Molly could answer, Beau's phone went off in her pocket. "Fuck." She pulled it out and checked the number. "Fuuuuuuuuuuck. Zeenoth called for backup before he barged in. Good for him, but you gotta bail before they get here."

Molly looked uncertain. "You'll be okay bullshitting this?"

"I'm a badass of many talents. And anyway, you probably need some... more... after I sort of, you know, _ chk_." She gestured at his chest. "So go get it, now that you're not rabid as fuck." She paused, then shrugged her windbreaker off and handed it to him. "And you need a new shirt."

"I'm going to make you replace it," he grumbled as he put it on and zipped it up to cover the bloodstains. "That was my favorite shirt."

"...Can we argue about this when there's _ not_ a combat team about to crawl straight up your undead ass?" she said dryly. 

“And not in the fun way,” Molly muttered. “I hate it when you make sense. I'll be at the bar you spotted me at. If you don't make it by dawn, I'll be there tomorrow night."

"Cool." She pushed him. "Now fuck off, obnoxious one."

He grinned at her, and even with all the blood around his mouth, it was the old, insufferable Molly-smile she remembered. "Glad to have you back, unpleasant one~" Then he took off.


	5. Pooka

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Explanations and 'What's New Pussycat' cued up entirely too many times.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact, this was written over a year ago, *well* before we knew what consecution was. XD

_ Some centuries ago, a confluence of arcane energies reached an event horizon of cataclysmic proportions, and irrevocably altered the very fabric of reality. It is said that this event is the root cause of the decline of magic, and it is certainly responsible for the decline of the Fae. When the gateways to the realms of the Fae were sealed, the True Fae retreated to their realms and lost contact with the mortal realms. Other Fae were not as lucky, and were trapped on this side of the veil. In order to protect themselves from a suddenly hostile environment in a world rapidly becoming bereft of magic, destined to become too busy for beauty and too shrewd to dream, they were forced to rely upon magicks more ancient than even they were. Thus the changelings were born, immortal Fae spirits constantly reborn in mortal forms, dormant until their magic reaches a peak and they awaken to their true natures... _

\- BE, "World of Darkness: Essays on the Supernatural"

* * *

It was almost three in the morning when Beau dropped into the chair next to Molly at the bar. He had been nursing a drink for the last hour and a half, after the bartender had given him some pointed looks about taking up space without buying anything. Beau eyed it. "You getting anything out of that?"

Molly snorted. "Have it. It's not doing shit for me." He pushed it over to her, and she downed it eagerly. "You're honor-bound to get shitfaced on my behalf, I hope you know that."

"Cool." She leaned back, then caught the bartender's attention and ordered a beer. "You okay now?"

He shrugged. "More or less. Still kinda sore, and trust me, we are _ going _ to talk about that shirt at some point."

"Oh, fuck you, Molly."

"Fuck you too, Beau~" He leaned against the bar, head propped up in his hand. "So how'd the cleanup go?"

She shrugged as she got her beer. "Zeenoth's in the infirmary. He lost some blood, but not enough to really be dangerous, and mostly they just want to make sure there's no lingering problems someone is going to have to do something about."

"...Is there?"

She rolled her eyes and punched him affectionately on the arm. "You didn't have _ time _ to do anything like that to him, asshole. Trust me. He'll be his normal irritating self after some plasma and about fourteen stitches. And then someone's going to yell at him for running in without checking the scene first."

"Good." Molly sighed. "I don't mind roughing someone up but there are some things I wouldn't do to my worst enemy."

Beau eyed him. "This got anything to do with that crack about getting body dumped?"

He nodded, gesturing at the large scar across his throat. "Yeah, that was really fun. At least they didn't mess up my ink, I'd have been pissed." He never felt like himself without his tattoos.

"You weren't pissed _ already _?" Beau said, raising an eyebrow.

"Oh, no, I _ was _ , once I thought about it, but there's not anything I can _ do _ about it, so why stress?" He shrugged. "I'm already how I am, can't change that, not in this world. Even if I knew who to get revenge on, which I _ don't _."

"Fair enough." Beau nodded, then shrugged. "Anyway, I gave 'em a bullshit description so hopefully they'll go chasing after a big bald motherfucker with a gold tooth."

Molly raised an eyebrow. "They bought that shit?"

"They bought it enough that they went lookin' for him. They're punks, I just wanted to buy some time. The part I'm worried about is when Dairon figures out I'm not coming back. She's smarter than the rest and I _ know _ she can kick my ass."

"High praise, coming from you," Molly said, smirking.

"Yeah. She's kind of cool. She's like... the only one I don't actively hate?"

Molly snickered. "_ Very _ high praise~"

"Shut up," she growled. "Anyway, you said Yasha's awake? She around?"

"No," Molly said, shaking his head. "She's been looking for everyone else. She loops back around to the carnival every few weeks." Something occurred to him, and he checked his pockets. "Shit. I just remembered, she called while I was trying to hold you down, and I dropped my phone." He pouted.

Beau winced a little guiltily. "I'll see if I can't find it in the morning. Probably not too safe for you to go back right now."

"Nah, it's okay. It was a piece of shit anyway. Yasha will probably be here in a couple of days or so, I didn't get a chance to say much to her and... well, you know Yasha." Molly shrugged. "I'll get another one tomorrow night, and give her the new number when I see her."

"Oh _ fuck _, she's going to kill me..." Beau groaned.

"I won't let her," Molly said sharply. "We agreed, didn't we? Not to hold grudges for misunderstandings that happen before we wake up. Remember? Like that time Fjord almost shot Caleb."

"...I had to physically restrain Nott from murdering him when that happened," Beau pointed out.

"Well, okay, that's true, but we both know Yasha's more reasonable than Nott." Beau snorted, and Molly grinned a little. "Anyway she was ready to mercy kill me before she woke up this time around, so I don't think she'll judge you too harshly."

"Tch." She signaled the bartender for another shot.

"Anyway, now that we've brought it up..." Molly leaned back a little. "I remember people, and I remember some shit we've gotten up to and that we've done it a few times now, but I _ don't _ remember how we got involved in this nonsense or how we're planning to get back. Yasha said Caleb was the one who knows the most about it, but you understood it better than she did."

Beau rolled her eyes as the bartender handed over her drink. "Okay, so, as far as I know, none of us actually _ knows _ how this shit started, or if we did, we don't remember. Not even Caleb. We just keep... waking up in different worlds, scattered to hell and back. Not sure if it's real or like a dream or what, Caleb said something about different possibilities but I wasn't really paying attention to that part. And then you know that we're all like... _ people _ in these worlds, we've all got our own lives and shit."

Molly nodded. "And then something happens and we wake up and remember Exandria and that's usually a bad trip. Then we get to go track everyone else down and wake them up which is always _tons_ of fun."

"Yep. So you know that part. There's like this... door. So far, we're the only ones who can see it, and it's always _ somewhere _. We can't open it without all of us, but once we get everyone together and get the door open, that's our way out." She sighed. "And then we hope that this one's the fucking door that gets us back home, but it hasn't yet. So the whole goddamn pain in the ass starts all over again."

Molly made a face. "Oh. Right. I knew there was something about the whole mess that annoyed the fuck out of me." He leaned against the bar again. "Am I remembering right that physical shit that happens doesn't carry over?"

Beau shrugged. "Hasn't yet."

"Oh thank fuck." He sighed. "I mean, I'm always fabulous, but- well, it's limiting."

She went to take a sip of her drink. "Yeah. I can see that-" Suddenly she choked and reflexively spat her drink out. "What the _ fuck _?!" She looked down, wiping her mouth, and gaped at the shot glass full of milk. "I'm not over the line yet, why would-"

Molly blinked. "I could have sworn that was full of whisky."

Beau started to say something, but there was a slight commotion. There were a couple of other patrons in the bar, this time of night, and they both had just reacted the same way Beau had. They were already pretty drunk, judging by the slurred protests and demands for explanation, and even across the bar, Molly and Beau could see they both had shots of milk in front of them. Beau looked around. "...Molly, you're seeing this?"

Molly's eyes narrowed. "Yeah, this is weird. Do you think-?"

He was interrupted by the battered jukebox in the corner suddenly blaring into life, playing 'What's New Pussycat'. Molly groaned. "_ Augh _, not this bit, it's probably cued up about seventeen times. I mean, I enjoy pranks as much as the next guy but I'm not in the mo-" He stopped mid sentence and looked at Beau.

She looked up at him sharply. "...milk-"

They stared at each other for a moment. Then they both erupted from their seats at the same time, Beau barely remembering to toss money down for her drinks, and they shot out the door.

* * *

"You know, you'd think she'd be easier to spot... subtle has never been her strongest suit," Molly grumbled, twenty minutes later. He flopped down on a bench next to Beau. There weren't many people in the street, but no trace of anyone who could be the one they were looking for. "And she can't have been more than ten or twenty seconds ahead of us..."

"She can do a _ lot _ with ten or twenty seconds," Beau said, shaking her head. "Ask her about the temple to the Platinum Dragon, you'll like that one."

"I expect that means it was glorious chaos. I'm sorry I missed it." He sighed. "But that doesn't really help us now..."

"No... we've still got to track her down..." Beau thought for a moment, then snapped her fingers. "Should have thought of this before. Come on."

"Where are we going?"

"Twenty four hour bakery."

Molly hummed in agreement. It was probably the best place to check... certainly had better odds than most places. There were barely any people in, it being the middle of the night, and a bored cashier was flipping through something on their phone. The only other customer was a man with glasses and probably bleached hair, who had a somewhat sleep deprived look that Molly thought suggested the man's wife or girlfriend might be expecting. Well, good for him~

Beau asked the cashier something about sweet pastries, and they were rewarded with the information that the last they had for the night had been bought out only a little while ago. While Beau tried to get him to remember more details about the woman who'd bought them without seeming super creepy, Molly wandered around a bit. Idly, he noticed that one of the empty shelf tags was upside down, then shrugged a little and flipped it back the right way up. As he turned to read the description of another sort of pastry, he was marginally aware that another customer had come in, a chubby, short woman with skin a shade or two lighter than Beau's, like a polished topaz, and short, dark, wavy hair, who seemed to be inspecting the shelves as well.

Beau wrapped up her conversation with the cashier and turned back to Molly, who came over to join her. "Best he can do is a dark haired girl in a pink dress, and an accent."

Molly nodded as they turned to go. "So, probably her, but not really much to go on..."

"Yep."

Molly's gaze fell on the young woman he'd half-noticed before. Dark hair, but her dress was blue, not pink. He was about to dismiss it when he noticed she'd moved to the tag he'd straightened before, and as he watched, she discreetly but very deliberately turned it upside down again.

It couldn't be _ that _ easy, could it?

Well, there was one way to find out.

He nudged Beau, and indicated the woman, just as she pulled another couple of tags off the shelf and switched them around. Beau blinked, then glanced at Molly and shrugged. "Worth a shot." She took a step forward. "Jester?"

The girl looked up with a brilliant smile. "Oh, hello~" The smile and her accent left no doubt. "That's me~" She blinked at them, and looked momentarily confused. "Ah, have we met? I _ totally _ feel like we have but I don't know your names." She rocked back and forth on her heels, and for a moment, Molly caught a glimpse behind the seeming, a brief impression of blue and startlingly violet eyes and a tail swishing behind her. Then she looked over at Molly, and her smile faded. "Oh. Ah... you're..." She visibly shivered, and took a step back.

She always had been good at putting up a mask, but Molly didn't miss the fear in her eyes or the slight crackle he could feel around her, like static building up. "Jester-" She squeaked, then backed up some more without taking her eyes off him. Then she turned and darted out of the shop. Beau started after her, but Molly grabbed her arm. "If we chase her they'll call the cops," he said in a low voice, inclining his head in the direction of the cashier and the man in the glasses, who were both watching them with bemusement.

"Fuck," Beau growled. "What do we do?"

"See if we can't track her down, I guess. We know what she looks like now." After a moment, he shrugged, and left the bakery. "She's scared."

"What the fuck is she scared of us for? She was just like normal when we started talking..."

"She's not scared of _ us _ , she's scared of _ me _. She pinged what I am. Same as you did." Molly stuffed his hands in his pockets. "So maybe you better talk to her, when we find her again."

Beau winced. "Fuck. Sure. I can do that."

They walked in silence for a few minutes, trying to see where Jester had gotten off to. "Beau?"

She glanced over at him. "Yeah?"

"I don't want to do another one where my friends are scared of me."

She sighed, and awkwardly patted his shoulder. "...I know. I wish I could promise that you won't have to."

"... Thanks, Beau." He looked around. "I don't know that we're going to be able to find her tonight, and I need to get back to the carnival before daybreak."

"We've still got a couple of hours, don't we?"

"I think so?"

"So we can look around a little more, right?" Beau was never very good with just waiting around, she always preferred to be _ doing _ something.

"Hm... I have a feeling if she doesn't want to be found, it's going to be a bitch." He looked around again thoughtfully. But there was a faint tickle at the back of his head that he had learned to listen to a long time ago, and after a moment, reached into his pocket for his deck. He didn't bother shuffling it, just pulled a card at random, thinking about their current predicament. He looked at it, raising an eyebrow, then flipped it over to show Beau. "The Star, upright. Hope and faith." He put it back in the deck and tucked the deck back safely into his pocket. "So let's keep at it for a little while longer."

"Cool cool cool cool." She nodded, and they kept going, wandering around trying to spot Jester. To be honest, it was mostly aimless wandering at this point, since neither one of them had any idea where she might have gone. But it made them feel like they were doing something.

They'd been at it for another hour when Beau stopped, staring at something in disbelief. "What the fuck? Molly? Is that a red weasel?"

"Is what a _ what _?" Molly blinked at her, a bit non-plussed.

Beau wordlessly pointed at the patio of a closed cafe. There was something under one of the tables, peering at them with bright eyes. Molly's eyes were better adjusted to the dark than Beau’s were, and after a moment, he managed to pick out the shape in the shadows. It was long and lithe, with an adorably pointed nose and tiny ears. Its sleek fur was two-toned- cream patches on its underbelly, its ears, and its muzzle, and red fur on its back, tail, and a mask stripe across its eyes. "...No. That's a red ferret."

"Jester had a red weasel for a pet," Beau muttered uncertainly. "Do you think..?"

"I think all we can do is try and see~" He grinned facetiously, then smacked Beau's ass and shoved her forward.

"AUGH! _ GODDAMMIT _ MOLLY, I'M GOING TO YANK YOUR FUCKING ARM OFF AND BEAT YOU WITH IT!" She whirled on him, snarling, and seemed to have forgotten what they were here for and was ready to kick his ass.

He cackled shamelessly. "I'm sorry darling, I had to do it~"

"YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY _ NOT _ FUCKING SORRY."

"...You're right, I'm not. Are you going to talk to the ferret or not?"

Beau growled something best left unheard, and turned back to the little cafe, where the ferret was still under the table. Beau considered it uncertainly for a moment, then hopped the low fence surrounding the patio and pulled a chair out, flipping it around to straddle it backwards. "Uh... okay. Okay okay okay. I'm talkin' to a ferret. Guess it's not the dumbest shit I've done. Uh... I don't know if that's you, Jester, or... uh... if you can hear me, but it's the best lead we've got I guess. So...I'm just gonna... this would be easier if one of the others was here. So, we're roommates, I guess? Not here. Where we're really from. You were right before, you _ do _ know us, both of us, you just don't remember. I know you usually have dreams about us and the rest, and have drawings in your journal, if you keep one. Or at least you have before. I'm Beau, the one you usually draw with blue robes and kicking someone's fucking ass. That's Molly," she said, pointing in his direction. "I know he spooked you before but he's not going to hurt you. He's _ supposed _ to be the most garishly purple motherfucker, with horns and a tail, with a coat that is intentionally the _ tackiest _ fucking thing you've ever seen. You have horns and a tail when you're at home too, and you're blue. You've quoted a trashy romance novel at me so many times that _ I _ damn near have the thing memorized. You're like... super strong, and we beat the shit out of each other once because fight clubs are awesome. You can summon a giant floating fucking lollipop and wreck everyone's shit. You've saved our asses like... a _ lot _, even if you don't like healing." She paused for a moment, and Molly took the opportunity to hiss something in Infernal.

The ferret perked its ears up, and tilted its head at Beau. "Come on, Jester. Wake up." The ferret considered her for a moment more, then chittered at her, and darted off, towards a large ornamental shrub in a cement planter. "Ah _ shit _, wait!" Beau jumped up, but before she could hop back over the fence, Jester walked around the other side of the shrub, looking a little uncertain. Beau stopped. "Jester?"

Suddenly, Jester's face split into a huge smile, and she flung herself at Beau, hugging her tight enough that Beau's ribs cracked. "Oh, _ Beau _ ! It _ is _ you, I _ knew _ I was looking for something else, I _ told _ the Traveler there was something I needed to find!"

Beau hugged her back, not as awkwardly as she thought she might. "We missed you, Jester."

Molly cleared his throat. "You got a hug for me too, darling?" He was still keeping his distance, and tried not to sound as needy as he felt.

"Oh Molly! Of _ course _ I do!" She let go of Beau and darted over to him, throwing her arms around him. He smiled, relieved and hugged her back. "I should have known it was you, with all those tattoos~"

"That's all right, darling. Beau didn't know me at first either," he said, dropping a kiss on the top of her head.

When he pulled back, Jester looked at him seriously. "I'm sorry I ran away from you," she said softly. "I thought-"

"It's all right," he said, just as softly, and rubbed her back. "I understand. It's not your fault, dear."

"I should have _ known _ better," she said stubbornly. "I should have _ know _ _n_ you weren't bad."

"Darling, how _ could _ you have, if you didn't remember who I was? There are a lot out there that _ are _ awful, believe me, I _ know _. Someone told you enough that you recognized the signs, and they told you to keep away from people like me, didn't they? For your own safety."

She nodded, then leaned against his chest again. "There's a lot of things we have to watch out for, sometimes. There was a nest in the last city I was staying in, and sometimes people would go missing. And it's pretty bad when they take someone normal, but the Traveler said it would be _ super _ bad for people like us."

"Well, you're safe with us," Molly said, giving her another small kiss.

Beau came over to join them. "People like us?" she asked, curiously. "What's that mean?"

Jester immediately brightened, then released Molly and clapped her hands. "Ooh! You're human, Beau! You can't see it, can you?" Beau just blinked at her, puzzled. "Can you see it, Molly?"

"Some," Molly said and grinned. "It comes and goes. It is _ entirely _ unfair that you get a tail and I don't," he added with a fake pout.

"...Tail?" Beau said, with a raised eyebrow, then leaned over to visibly check Jester's backside.

"Okay, so, this is like super cool~ I can ench- wait." Jester paused, screwing up her face thoughtfully. "Okay, I _ think _ that's one of those rules I technically can't break, technically. So I can't do it without your permission. Beau, is it okay if I enchant you so you can see me? It might feel a little tingly but it won't hurt."

Beau blinked, then glanced over at Molly who gave her a thumbs up. "Sure? I guess?"

"Okay, close your eyes~!" Beau shrugged, and did. Jester giggled, then brought her closed hand up near her face. She opened it, revealing what looked like a pile of luminous pink glitter in the palm of her hand. She blew it off, forming a sparkling pink cloud that gradually settled over Beau and then disappeared.

"That feels _ so _ fuckin' weird," Beau muttered.

"Okay, you can open your eyes~ I gave you a little bit of my magic so you can see what I _ really _ look like~"

Beau opened her eyes, and blinked several times. There was a wavy, pink haze over everything, though that was fading, and the street seemed subtly altered or stretched somehow, almost like there was another scene overlapping it that she couldn’t quite make out. She looked over at Jester, who seemed to be outlined in a faint shimmering aura, and she seemed a little brighter and a little more sharply defined than she had been. Molly had some kind of aura too, though it made him look a little darker and more shadowy. "Wow. That's trippy." Then she blinked, and moved closer to Jester, leaning in. She did look quite different than she had before; the cute blue dress she'd been wearing before was actually the same dress that Jester had worn when Beau first met her and her hair was the same shade of blue. Her eyes, which _ had _ looked brownish-green, were a bright sparkling violet. But the parts that got Beau's attention the most were the two cream-colored, round furry ears peeking out of her hair, a long pointed tail swishing behind her covered with sleek red fur, and some kind of birthmark that looked like a mask across her eyes, the same shade of red as her tail. "Holy _ shit _. That's weirdly adorable."

Jester giggled. "I know~ I look _ totally _ amazing~"

Beau blinked a few more times, then shook her head slightly. "Okay, I didn't know that was a thing." Then she paused, and considered Jester's markings again. "...Are you a fucking _ were-ferret _?"

That got another peal of giggles. "No, but that would be super awesome if I was~"

Molly grinned, and gave her a one-armed hug. "She's a pooka~"

"A what?"

"A kind of shape-shifting faerie~" Molly said. "They can turn into animals~"

Beau thought about that. "So... a ferret pooka?"

Jester beamed. "That's right~ Normal humans can't see _ this _ side of things, but I gave you some of my magic and now you can~"

"So I'm seeing fae shit now?" Jester nodded, and Beau raised an eyebrow. "Huh. Neat."

"And from what I hear, pookas are super mischievous," Molly said with a smirk.

"Well, you know, things can get so boring~" Jester said, with a perfectly innocent grin that both of the other two _ immediately _ and _ absolutely _ did not trust.

Molly laughed. "Oh, I _ have _ missed you darling. But I've got to get back to the carnival," he said, pointing at the sky, which was starting to take on a pre-dawn tinge. "The sun will be up soon."

Beau nodded. "Jester, do you have a place to stay?"

"Oh, sure, I'm at the prettiest hotel downtown~ Do you want to come stay with me, Beau?"

"Eh, sure, why the fuck not? My apartment's a dump anyway. Tomorrow we can see about looking for some of the others, and Molly can catch up later."

"Okay~ And I'm like a _ really _ good detective so we can totally find everyone else~" Jester beamed, then it faded into a more contemplative expression. "I'm really glad you found me. I missed you, even though I didn't know what I was missing. I really love you guys."

Molly squeezed her hand before he started off. "We love you too, darling."


	6. Tremere

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Caleb is having trouble coping but Nott is there for him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is actually the chapter I'm proudest of right now and one of the main reasons I wanted to write this fic.

_ In general, vampires tend to be a solitary lot. It is typically easier for a single vampire to make their way than for a group. However, sometimes, a small group of vampires will come together for mutual benefit, protection, and sometimes companionship. These groups or clans tend to be constructed around what is referred to as bloodlines, which is a social construct based on a ‘parent’ vampire and those they have turned. Some clans have little more organization than that, while others employ a more rigid hierarchy, typically based on age and experience as well as ‘generation’, or how many steps removed from the head of the clan one is. Of course, in a clan structure, social tendencies are amplified: clans comprised of members who take pains to get what they need with as little harm done as possible are well-adjusted and barely a burden to their community, while clans comprised of members embodying a more typical and predatory mindset can be a terrible scourge…. _

\- BE, "World of Darkness: Essays on the Supernatural"

* * *

It was at least an hour and a half after sunset when Caleb's eyes snapped open. He woke as he always did, as he had every night for years now, disoriented and shaken by dreams he could never remember. He was certain the dreams were not kind because so little in his life _ was _, but he honestly had no idea if it would be better or worse if he could retain them when he woke. And he rather thought that uncertainty bothered him more than not remembering the dreams in the first place.

He'd long ago learned how to stop jolting upright when he woke; it simply wasn't _ practical _ when one habitually slept in a wooden box. But it always took him a few minutes to get his breathing back under control. Tonight it took longer than it usually did, and that coupled with the fact that he had overslept by an hour was not at _ all _ a good sign. Neither was the fact that his hands were shaking.

He was bound and determined to ignore that part.

Once he had himself more or less in hand, Caleb pushed the lid open and sat up, rubbing his face. Nearly as soon as he did, his cat hopped over the edge and into his lap, purring. "_ Hallo _ , Frumpkin," he said, holding the cat to his chest and cuddling him. Frumpkin always settled his nerves somewhat, and after a few minutes he felt more equal to the task of actually getting up and getting to work. He'd slept in his clothes again, and after some consideration, he elected not to change out of the oversized sweater and worn slacks. The rest would probably say some pretty vicious things about it behind his back, but they wouldn't say it to his _ face _ and he didn’t have the energy to _ care. _

He slept in the back corner of the library, behind a floor to ceiling bookshelf crammed full of dusty leather-bound books. The library was one of the few luxuries he was allowed... at least, that he was willing to accept, and he kept to it as much as he could. It was the largest room in the cellar, lined with bookshelves and desks, with pleasantly dim electrical lighting. All of the shelves and most of the other flat surfaces were crammed full of books and small magical artifacts, stolen from chantries and occult collections all over the world.

If the circumstances were nearly anything different, it would be practically heaven.

Though he supposed he could have found himself in a worse position than clan archivist.

There were some soft sounds of movement in the main part of the library. Astrid and Eodwulf could and did use the library as they saw fit; he couldn't quite bring himself to bar them from it, since they had all been scholars together once, but Frumpkin was too relaxed for either of them to be nearby. And it wouldn't be any of the others; as far as the rest of the clan was concerned, this was his inviolate domain and to enter it without his explicit permission was courting his wrath.

And he had proven on a few memorable occasions that he wasn't kept around just as a dedicated archivist. He'd been a powerful mage once, and retained more of that part of himself than any other member of the clan.

So that meant it was almost certainly Nott. And sure enough, when he came around the bookshelves, she was tucked into her little nest of cushions in one of the shadowy corners, with some slightly wilted flowers spread out around her, working on something in her lap. Caleb watched her for a moment, wondering again why she continued to torture herself by staying in such a hostile, dead place when they couldn't keep her here. Though he was selfish enough that he was glad she stayed. "_Guten abend_, Nott," he said quietly as he made his way over to the desk near her nest.

"You slept late tonight, Caleb," she said, as she plaited some fine, golden strands together. What looked suspiciously like Astrid's hairbrush was in her lap, and Caleb knew enough about Nott's kind of magic to know he didn't want to know what she was doing. Safer that way for both of them. "Are you all right?"

"_ Ja_. _ Ja_. I am good," he said as he sat down at his desk and tried to still the trembling in his hands through sheer force of will.

"Are you sure? You haven't fed in over two weeks now." She put her project down and looked at him seriously with lantern-bright eyes.

He had never been good with eye contact, even in the best of times, and now he looked away. "I have gone longer. I will be fine." He reached for his pen and notebook, intending to work on the translation he'd been at the last few nights. However, his fingers twitched and sent his pen rolling across the desk, and he made a sharp, frustrated sound.

"Caleb." Nott got up and came over to him. She took his hands in both of her own, and there was no way that she could miss the way they were shaking. "You need blood, Caleb."

"I can, I can push it one more night," he said stubbornly. "It is, it is just my hands are shaking, a little bit."

Nott tugged on his sleeve, and he turned around in his chair. "Let me see your eyes," she said gently. With him sitting and her standing, that actually put them on an equivalent eye level. After a moment, he nodded, and fixed his gaze on the barely-visible freckles across her nose. She studied his face for a moment, then squeezed his hand. "They're starting to turn red around the edges. You need to feed tonight," she said, leaning against him. She rubbed little circles in his back. "I'm sorry, Caleb. But you'll have the shakes, _ bad _ , by midnight if you don't get something before then. And if you push it off until _ tomorrow _ night, you're not going to have _ any _ control at _ all_." She let go of his hand to put her arms around his neck in a hug.

After a moment, he dropped his head onto her shoulder, his own arms going around her waist. They'd been through this a few times over the years, enough that he couldn't argue with her timeline. And as guilty as he'd feel for it tonight, that would be nothing compared to what losing control would do to him. He _ had _ to stay functional, if for no other reason than if he _ wasn't_, it would leave Nott at the dubious mercy of the rest of the clan.

Suddenly, Frumpkin hissed and darted into the narrow space behind one of the bookshelves. That was just enough warning for them to release each other and Nott to take a step away and Caleb to straighten up. Nott was more or less safe here because the others thought she was his pet or plaything, a possession like any of his books. He couldn't show this level of vulnerability to them, couldn't let them know how much he needed her, and they both knew it. If anyone _ ever _ saw that specific weak point, it would only be a matter of time before someone took advantage of it, and then none of their plans or his quiet rebellion would matter any more. Using Nott against him would break his will utterly.

They separated just in time. Eodwulf had opened the door, and was leaning against the door jamb, ignoring the hostile glare Nott leveled at him. "Astrid and I are going out," he said, in the same bored tone he used every night. "Are you coming with us, Bren?"

Caleb closed his eyes a little in resignation, then took a shaky breath and stood up. "..._ Ja_. _ Ja_, I will come."

* * *

It would have been better if they'd let him hunt on his own. Not _ good_, certainly, but less _ bad_. He'd _done_ the math, worked it out based on what his body seemed to demand versus how long he could go before problems started versus how much blood the average adult contained. A little every night would be enough to sustain him, while still being low enough that no one need die. It still wouldn't have been _ okay_, but at least he could have lived with himself.

But he'd run before. Certain orders had been put in place after that, orders he found incredibly difficult to disobey. One of those orders was that he was not to leave the mansion unless it was with Astrid or Eodwulf, who would make sure he didn't run again, who would drag him back by force if necessary. He'd never made it necessary, not after the first time, but he still couldn't go out without them, not even to hunt.

The rest of the clan didn't believe in leaving survivors. He’d tried it before, just taking what he needed and leaving whoever it was, but the others would finish off anyone he didn’t. So he put it off as long as he could, until he was stretched so thin that he could barely keep himself together. Then, when he inevitably gave in, he'd take everything his prey had and hate himself for it. But it was a corpse on his conscience only every couple of weeks, rather than more frequently. It was enough. It _ had _ to be enough.

At least he still had some control over who he picked. Most of the time.

The three of them were in the park. Small favors, the other two didn't feel the need to watch his _ every _ move, and had spread out a bit to attend to their own needs. Caleb was standing motionless under a tree that blocked the closest streetlight, wrapped in a worn trench coat that blended into the surrounding shadows. If one was looking closely, one could just make out the muted red of his hair in the slight amount of light that got through the leaves, and piercing blue eyes ringed with red. He was watching a young woman with long dark hair obscuring half her face hurry through, taking a shortcut through the park. His hands were jammed into his pockets, shaking worse than ever, and every instinct he had was screaming at him that she was alone, he could overpower her easily, and that she was just big enough to have enough blood to sate his thirst.

But he fought it. He let her pass him by without moving, still watching her progress. He'd let two other people go by before her, and he wasn't sure if he could let a fourth one go. And for once, fate was kind to him.

Just before the girl would have reached the edge of the park, another figure darted out of the bushes towards her, clearly having made some of the same calculations that Caleb had, that she was alone and easily overpowered. As he reached out to grab her, Caleb was already moving. The man had just gotten his hands on the girl, choking off her scream by clapping his hand over her mouth, and the other hand had a knife in it when Caleb hit him hard from behind. He jerked the man backwards by his hair and one arm, wrenching his knife hand back hard enough that something dislocated. Caleb's attack was brutally swift and precise, and the girl was able to tear herself out of her assailant's grasp, staggering a few steps away. She whipped around instinctively, eyes wide with fear, just as Caleb spun the man around to face him. He spared a moment to look up at the girl. "_Get out of here_," he snarled, his voice thick and savage. It could be hoped she’d have enough time to flee before Astrid or Eodwulf noticed her. 

He didn't watch as she nodded frantically and ran, just sank his fangs into the man's throat.

* * *

It was almost two in the morning when Caleb made it back to the safety of his library. He felt more clear headed, and his hands had stopped shaking, but he still made directly for his desk and collapsed in his chair, burying his face in his hands. Nott had been in her little nest in the corner, carefully finishing a small pouch stitched together with scraps of wool fabric and a coppery colored filament, but she put it down as soon as Caleb came in, sticking her needle in a cushion so it wouldn't get lost. She came over and put her arms around him, and Frumpkin coiled around his ankles, purring consolingly.

Nott kissed the top of his head. "...Was it very bad?" she asked after a moment.

There was a muffled noise, a breathless little thing that was meant to be a laugh but bordered on hysteria. "No," Caleb rasped. "No, that one I am sure deserved it," he said into his hands. "I was lucky tonight and found a very bad man." He leaned into Nott and lowered his hands from his face. "But perhaps three minutes later and it might have been the girl he tried to assault instead." He shuddered a little, and Nott rubbed his back. "...I am not sure how much longer I can keep doing this, _ mauschen_." 

"Oh Caleb." Nott hugged him tightly, resting her head against the crook of his neck as he put his arms around her to pull her close. His mental state always took a turn for the worse after he’d had to kill someone… "We'll get out of this. _ Both _ of us."

Tears were starting to run down his face. "You should leave me behind, Nott. This place is as bad for you as it is for me, and I am not worth staying for. I am a monster."

Nott pulled back slightly and brushed his hair out of his eyes, tucking it behind one ear with a maternal gesture. "We're both what was made of us," she whispered. "You're fangs and hunger. And I'm withered leaves and shadows. And we're both _ stuck _ with that, as long as we're in this world. We've _ both _ done awful things, not really by choice. If you're a monster, so am I."

"You are not a monster," he protested. "You _saw_ what I, what I did to-"

"That wasn't your fault," she said sharply. "That wasn't _you_. And they knew the job was dangerous when they took it." She stroked his hair. "Besides, I've suffocated people with mouths stuffed with rose petals for kicking the wrong line of mushrooms. We are what we were made, and we can't be blamed for that. But _ this _ is the part they don't know, the part that means we'll _ win _ one day. We're _ more _ than what they made of us, Caleb. You're more than your hunger and I'm more than my shadows. We're both more than they think we are. And that's where we'll _get_ them."

Frumpkin hopped up in Caleb's lap, rubbing against him until he automatically started petting the cat. "I do not know why you stay with me," Caleb said quietly, clutching Frumpkin to his chest. "I do not know why you keep putting me back together."

She rubbed his back. "I was lost and alone in the dark. It didn't matter where I turned, I couldn't find the way out. I was surrounded by whispers that lied to me and poison thorns that wouldn't let me through. I don't know how many times I tried to get away. And then, somehow, you sent Frumpkin to me, and he led me out, to you." She nuzzled him slightly. "I'll never leave you, Caleb."

There was a choked off sob, and he pressed a fist to his mouth to stifle it. Nott tilted his chin up, and wiped the tears off his face. "You're still human enough to cry," she said gently. "So am I. They couldn't take that away from us. Real monsters don't cry, not for real, not in a way that _ means _ anything. The ones who turned you, who twisted me, _ they're _ monsters. They tried to take everything away from us and make us like _ them _ and _ they failed_." Her yellow eyes flashed in determination. "And you don't know it yet, but we have friends. There are people out there who will help us."

He made a sound that Nott had come to learn meant 'sounds fake but okay.' "People like me do not have friends," he said in a dull, resigned tone. Then he huffed a little, and one corner of his mouth twitched up for a second. "Except for the occasional darkling that is too good for them. And even if they did, I have not spoken to anyone outside of this house for five years."

"This is a special case. And they're really strong. You'll see."

That got a tired, but genuine smile. "All right, _ mauschen_. If you say so." He reached out to catch her hand and squeeze it slightly. It was something akin to a miracle, how easily Nott could pull him out of the depths. "I am good now, I think."

She nodded, and gave him another hug before moving back to her nest. "Good. Are you going to work on your thing?"

"_ Ja_. There is not much else to do, everything else would require socializing and I would prefer to stay here with you. The work will settle me. And I have been meaning to finish this translation for three nights now."

"Okay." She returned to her own project, finishing the little pouch she'd been working on, and carefully tucked some of the flowers and twigs she'd stolen from the graveyard earlier in the day into it. Roses for protection, rue to counter dark magic. Then she stitched it closed with another coppery strand of hair. After examining it for a moment, she nodded, and pricked her finger on her brass sewing needle. She carefully squeezed three drops of the dark, greenish-tinged fluid that served for blood out of the slight wound, and dabbed it into the undyed fabric. Curses came easier to her than blessings, but charms were easy enough to make. She tied a long piece of yellow yarn to the little pouch, then got up and wandered back over to Caleb to tug on his sleeve. When he turned to look at her, she reached up to tie the yarn around his neck and tuck the pouch into his sweater. "This will protect you," she said as she knotted it. "Keep it with you."

He gave her a faint smile and brushed a kiss against the top of her head. "I will. Thank you, _ mein freund._"

She nodded, then yawned. "I'm going to go to sleep now. Do you want me to get anything for you tomorrow?" He shook his head. "Okay. Good night, Caleb." Then she climbed up one of the bookshelves to a particularly shadowy corner, curling up in the patch of shadow and fading from sight.

"_Gute nacht_, Nott."

He continued to work on his translation for a couple more hours before Frumpkin decided that was enough, and sprawled across the top of his desk, obscuring the text he was translating and trapping his writing hand. Caleb huffed a little in amusement. "_ Ja_, _ ja_, I see what you want." He picked Frumpkin up and shifted him to his shoulder, scratching the cat behind the ears as he stretched his back. "Okay. We will take a break." Frumpkin purred in his ear, kneading against Caleb's shoulder.

He wandered to the back part of the library, automatically checking to see if any of the books had been misplaced. While the only one around during the day was Nott, who had no interest, and after sunset, only Astrid and Eodwulf would come in without his knowledge, it did happen sometimes. But the shelves were still in perfect order as he made his way around the library. Then he reached the back wall of the library and stopped.

There was a door there, set into the brick wall of the cellar itself, and Caleb had often been puzzled by it. There was a staticy feeling of magic that clung to it, and at first, he thought the door was the reason this mansion had been picked for the clan's lair. But some careful observation, as well as some cautious questioning that had led to Astrid laughing at him, mussing his hair, and asking if he wasn't working too hard had made it clear to him that only he and Nott could see that it was here at all. He had no idea why. It would have made more sense if it was only one or the other, but both of them and only them was strange.

It looked old, possibly older than the foundation wall it was set in, and was of an arched design that had largely gone out of fashion save for ecclesiastical architecture and particularly pretentious residences and college buildings. The door itself was dark, knotted wood, with a heavy bronze latch. The doorframe was comprised of worn stone blocks that bore no resemblance to the bricks of the wall. Caleb had tried opening it before, but it was stuck fast. The latch didn't even shift, which made him wonder if it was just some elaborate set piece, not designed to open at all, of some sort of ritual significance. He'd never encountered any mention of it or anything like it in any of the books he'd ever read.

It fascinated him.

But the most fascinating part about it, beyond its entire existence, were the sigils carved into the door. There were eight of them, arranged in a circle, complex symbols that to a trained eye clearly had a deep arcane significance but were unconnected to any magical research Caleb was aware of. They were part of some long-settled system of arcane thought that was completely unknown to him.

When they had come here six years ago, the sigils had just been carvings. He'd thought it was just a design element of the door itself, and had concerned himself with studying the door as a whole. Then, shortly after the clan had come here, one of the symbols had started glowing, a bright golden light that inexplicably felt comforting. Five months after that, right after he'd met Nott, another had started flickering in a way that suggested a loose connection in an electric light. Nothing else had changed for some years after that. Then three months ago, two more of them started glowing. He wasn't sure if they had activated at the same time, but if they hadn't, it had surely been within the same week. Now another two had started glowing, and it had to have been sometime today or earlier in the evening, because he had checked last night and they hadn't been glowing then.

He studied it thoughtfully as he absently scratched Frumpkin's ears. He had no idea what any of the sigils meant, or what significance the glow had, or what was activating them, or what would happen when all eight were glowing. But somehow, he instinctively thought that it would be a good thing. He didn't know where that impression had come from, but it was strong enough he couldn't shake it. He also didn't know why one sigil out of eight wasn't either fully lit or fully dark, though the flickering suggested a tenuous or incomplete connection.

He was still studying the arrangement, idly considering and rejecting different theories, when he noticed movement. There was a dim golden light flowing through the carved lines of another sigil from the top to the bottom, a little like molten metal being poured into a mold. Then, once all the lines had been filled in, it flared bright and receded to match the glow of the other sigils.

Caleb blinked at it several times as Frumpkin twisted in his hold to paw at the newly glowing sigil. "Oh. Oh, that is... that is incredible." Gingerly, he touched it, half expecting it to bite him. Then he glanced down at his cat and held him up in front of his face. "Do you know what this means, Frumpkin?"

Frumpkin meowed.

"_ Ja_. I also have no clue."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not going to be posting a new chapter until after New Years.


	7. Convergence

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Field trips are had and plans are made and immediately discarded.

_ While it is exceedingly rare, it is not entirely unheard of for disparate groups to work together towards a common goal. The most stable such collaboration is often between different tribes of werewolves, who typically hold that the protection of their chosen territories and the surrounding areas as a sacred duty. Changelings also tend to be more cooperative than most, despite political differences among the different kiths, due to both tradition and increased safety potential. However, in the right set of circumstances and when confronting a grave enough situation, groups comprised of more diverse elements can form. It is not unusual for a given issue to prove a threat to both a werewolf territory and a changeling freehold, or a hunter to find that others are tracking the same threat as they are, and a temporary alliance forms based on the theory that 'the enemy of my enemy is my friend'. These alliances are typically temporary, often dissolving once the threat has been addressed. However, the denizens of the world behind the shadows can be as unpredictable as any human, and sometimes, deeper bonds form... _

_ \- _ BE, "World of Darkness: Essays on the Supernatural"

* * *

"Okay, so." Beau dug into the bag of pastries that Jester had left over from last night and came up with a danish that was only slightly stale. They were both sitting on the bed in Jester's hotel room. Beau had just slept in her clothes, but Jester was still in her nightgown, with her journal in her lap and a bearclaw in her mouth. Beau took a bite of her danish and continued. "So far, it's you and me and Molly, and he says Yasha's awake too and he thinks she'll be here in a day or two."

Jester nodded as she worked on a sketch. "So that's already half of us~ And we can totally start spreading out to check likely places, like bookstores or pawnshops or tea places or whatever~"

Beau started to say something, then stopped and thought about it. "I mean, we found you at a bakery. Makes sense."

Jester nodded, beaming. "And I can ask the Traveler if he's heard about any of them at any of the freeholds. Oooh, wouldn't it be awesome if the others were faeries too~? Nott would make a _ super _ cute piskie~"

"I don't know what that is," Beau said, finishing her danish in three bites. "Fae shit really isn't my department. I didn't even really know it was a thing until last night. The Traveler's around in this world?"

"He is~!" Jester nodded eagerly, giggling. "He's not a god here, but he _ is _ a _ super _ important sidhe, he looked after me when I was little. He knows like... _ all _the faeries~"

"Huh. Well, can't hurt to ask him," Beau said, shrugging. "I've still got access to the Cobalt Reserve database, I'll see if there's anything in there that stands out as our crew."

"Okay~" Jester finished her sketch and closed her journal. "And in the meantime, let's go exploring~!"

"Yeah, sure, why not." Beau shrugged. Honestly, that had as much chance as anything else did to turn something up. Maybe more, now that Jester was with her. "We've got a couple hours of daylight before Molly's up, anyway." Since it had been nearly dawn when they crashed, they'd both slept late into the day.

"They've got a _zoo_ here! With red pandas~! And giant hissing cockroaches~!" She looked seriously at Beau and grabbed her shoulders. "Beau. Beaaaaaaaaaau. We should _ totally _ go to the zoo."

Beau raised an eyebrow at her. "...Maybe after we find the others?" Jester gave her a particularly devastating puppy dog expression, her bottom lip quivering. "...You wanna see the hissing cockroaches that bad, huh?"

"And the red pandas!" She giggled, and dug into her bag for a brochure. "They've got a botanical garden too, maybe Caduceus goes and talks to the flowers."

Beau shrugged. "I guess it can't hurt to check." They had some time to kill anyway, and sometimes, it was just easier to let Jester have her way. And she had a point about the botanical garden. Looking at the brochure, it looked like the kind of place Caduceus would be into. "So we can go wander around there until it closes or it gets dark, whichever comes first."

Jester nodded enthusiastically. "That is an _ awesome _ plan~"

* * *

They had enough spare cash between them to pay for one adult admittance. Fortunately, Jester had never paid admittance to anything in her life, and while Beau was waiting in line, she wandered behind a large banner attached to a lamppost, and Beau just caught sight of a red ferret scurrying through the iron fence that blocked off the edge of the zoo to guests. By the time Beau got in, Jester was waiting for her, having somehow acquired a massive lump of fried dough coated in a frankly alarming amount of cinnamon and sugar.

Beau eyed it with some trepidation. "Didn't you finish off the bag of pastries at the hotel?"

"Yep~" Jester licked some of the sugar off her fingers. "You can _ never _have too many pastries~"

"...Out of curiosity, how do sugar highs take you in this go round?"

"Oh, about the same way as they usually do, I think~"

"Good to know," Beau said, nodding.

Though surprisingly, the day wasn't as chaotic as Beau had been bracing for. Jester squealed about basically all the animals, which was only to be expected, and Beau thought it was all pretty neat. She especially liked the raptors they had, the hawks and eagles and shit. The day had been going fairly smoothly, surprisingly so.

Then Jester saw the peacocks and her eyes lit up in a way that did not bode well for anyone's blood pressure. "...Oooh. I bet I could _ totally _ get in there and _ totally _ sneak a peacock out."

Beau glanced at her. "...You absolutely could. Don't."

Jester pressed against the glass of the enclosure. "But it would be so much fun! And technically how often do you get the opportunity to get a _ whole peacock _ out of the zoo?"

"...What would you even _ do _ with a peacock?" Beau asked, raising an eyebrow. "You're staying at a hotel. You can't exactly smuggle a peacock into a hotel room. They'll notice. Peacocks are the opposite of subtle. And you can't just let it go outside, it'll get hit by a car or something."

"Well, no, I couldn't do that, that would be mean..." She frowned for a moment, then she lit up again. "I could give it to Molly~! He'd love it~!

Beau resisted the urge to facepalm. "The little shit totally would. But he doesn't have a permanent place to stay here either, and I'm just gonna go ahead and tell you that my apartment won't accept pets and _ definitely _ would call the fucking cops on me if I showed up with a _ peacock _ . And you know, peacocks are _ mean _ little fuckers. Kind of like swans. They're not exactly the sort of pet you give someone you _ like _, Jessie."

Jester hummed thoughtfully, still pressing her nose to the glass. "What about someone you don't like?"

Beau stopped. The idea of shipping an enraged peacock to her asshole parents was a powerful one, and it might actually be worth the fallout they’d get hit with. But they didn't really need to committing what was probably a felony before they got everyone back together. Or at least, they didn't need to be committing _ unrelated _ felonies. "...Let's come back to that one later. Wait until we've at least got Nott back."

"Ooh, you're right~! Nott would probably have fun with it too~! We should _ totally _ come back and get a peacock after we've found Nott and Caleb and Fjord and Caduceus~ Then send it to someone who's a _ total _ dickbutt~"

Beau grinned. "Might be fun. We'll see how things go."

Jester giggled. "I bet it will be _ super _ fun~" But she seemed content to let it go at least for now, which was probably for the best.

Unfortunately, they didn't manage to run into anyone while they were there. But it was a good way to kill the time until the sun started going down. The general idea was to meet Molly back at the bar and then see where it went from there. The sun was just starting to set, and if he wasn't there by the time they got across town to it, it probably wouldn't take him long to get there. It was a nice enough evening for a walk, anyway.

They were just passing what was probably meant to be a park, but was just a sort of grassy area with some trees and what looked like a tiny excuse for a pond with a kitschy little wooden bridge across it. There was a worn, decorative wrought iron fence around it that wouldn't have kept out a particularly determined sock monkey. Jester had been walking on the inside of the sidewalk, but as they approached the park, she paused, and then moved over to switch places with Beau, so that Beau was on the inside, closer to the park. Beau was about to ask about it, when movement in the park itself caught her eye. Then she stopped dead, and threw one arm out to stop Jester as well.

Jester ran into her arm abruptly, and cut off the story she'd been telling (something involving a prom dress, a fog machine, and a squirrel). She looked up at Beau uncertainly. "Beau?" Then she looked in the direction that Beau was, and squeaked.

An enormous wolf was standing in the middle of the park, watching them with a weirdly intense expression. There was something odd about its gaze that Beau couldn't quite put her finger on. Somehow, someone had put a big thick leather collar on it, apparently trying to pass it off as like... a giant husky or some shit, but that was _ very clearly _ a wolf. The coat was a weird gray color that shifted in darker and lighter patches in the street lights.

For a moment, neither of them moved or said anything. Then Beau spoke up. "Jester. You're seeing that too, right?" Jester nodded, though she didn't say anything. "It's not acting like a normal wolf. And it's got a weird glowy aura like you and Molly do. Except its brown." Something about that made the wolf's ears perk up.

"I don't think it's a normal wolf, Beau."

As she said it, the wolf seemed to rear back on its hind legs and its outline seemed to shift and stretch, with a series of uncomfortable sounding cracks and pops. It was a lot quicker than it looked in the movies at least. The whole process only took about two and a half seconds. Then there was an enormous woman in rough, handmade clothes standing there, looking at them a little hesitantly with heterochromatic eyes. Incongruously, the dog collar was still resting loosely around her neck.

Jester immediately brightened, and clapped her hands. "Yasha~!" She charged forward, throwing her arms around the bigger woman.

Yasha was a bit startled by Jester's sudden enthusiasm, and involuntarily took a step back. Then she awkwardly patted her on the back. "...Hi, Jester."

Jester bounced a little. "Molly said you'd be back soon~!"

Yasha looked over at Beau. "Is he okay? I talked to him, but we got... cut off."

Beau rubbed the back of her neck. "Yeah, he's okay now. There was... well, waking me up was a bitch."

"We're going to go meet up with him at the bar, since he couldn't get up until it was dark and I wanted to go to the zoo anyway~" Jester chirped.

Yasha was looking at Beau with an expression she couldn't identify, and Beau shivered involuntarily. She'd forgotten how intense Yasha's gaze could be. But after a moment, she just nodded and looked down at Jester. "The zoo?"

"Yes~! It was _ super _ cool and they had _ so _ many cute animals, like, seriously, _ so many _ , Yasha~! They even have some big pretty wolves, but not as big as you and they're normal wolves not Yasha-wolves which is _ probably _ good because that would really be _ super _ creepy if they could turn into people and they were in the zoo-"

"...Jester."

"-and they had peacocks! And I still want to sneak one out, but we couldn't decide what to _ do _ with it, and I thought about giving it to Molly because it would match his tattoos but Beau said they're not really a pet for someone nice, so I thought we could give it to someone _ mean _, but then we thought that Nott would have fun helping us steal it so we decided to wait-"

"_ Jester _." Yasha's voice had a barely perceptible hint of a panicked whine under it, like she didn't know what to do with Jester's sudden excited rush of words- and to be fair, Beau didn't either. Yasha reached out and covered Jester's mouth with her hand for a moment. Jester squeaked, but obligingly stopped talking. "...You should. Um. Breathe. Probably."

Jester giggled. "Sorry, I know I get super excited sometimes~" She leaned against Yasha affectionately.

Yasha gave her another awkward pat. "It's okay. It was. Just. A little... much." She looked up at Beau. "You said you were meeting Molly at a bar?"

"Yeah. We should probably get going, it's not that far from here. He'll be fuckin' delighted, I don't think he was expecting you this quick."

She looked away. "I got worried."

"...Sorry."

Yasha shook her head. "You weren't yourself. It's okay." She started drifting in the direction they'd been going. "I don't think... _ any _ of us were ourselves at first." Jester hummed and followed her, skipping a bit. "I'm not sure what Nott would have done, if it hadn't worked. When I went to wake her up."

Jester clapped her hands. "Ooh, you found Nott? Is she _ with _ you?" She looked around, trying to spot her.

Yasha shook her head. "Um. No. She stayed put. But I know where to find her. More or less. And I know her smell now."

Beau raised an eyebrow. "Did you find Caleb too?"

"No, I... Nott said they're together. But. It's... complicated. I think... it would be better to wait. Until we meet up with Molly to explain."

"Tch." Beau shoved her hands in her jacket pockets. "At least we won't have to check every police station, hospital, and homeless shelter in a twenty mile radius to find his skinny Zemnian ass this time..."

"That's true, it's always easier for Nott and Caleb to find each other~" Jester said, beaming. "It does make things a lot less complicated, like a _ lot _."

The corner of Yasha's mouth twitched up briefly, then she shook her head. "Well... less complicated, maybe. But I think it's going to be harder this time."

* * *

They'd been at the bar for twenty minutes, at a commandeered table in the back corner, when Molly showed up. Beau had just been surreptitiously unplugging the jukebox before Jester could start fucking with it again, and she gave Molly half a wave as he sauntered through the door. Then she paused, and rolled her eyes. As they both got to the table, she glared at him. "You've got blood on your mouth again."

He blinked, then sheepishly wiped it off. "Thanks..."

"Seriously, how did you _ never _ run into a hunter before me?"

He made a face at her. "Give me a break, I've only got three months of experience." Then he beamed at Yasha who was nursing a beer and regarding him with a soft expression that was equal parts fondness and exasperation. "Yasha~! You made good time~" He flopped down in the chair next to her, and snuggled against her, then leaned up to kiss her jaw.

"Hi, Molly," she said softly, and nuzzled the top of his head a little.

"Sorry I sort of hung up on you last night... things got a little exciting and then I managed to lose my phone. I've got another one, I'll put my number in for you at some point tonight."

She blinked at him. "You have a new number now?"

He nodded. "Yeah. It wasn't worth the hassle of trying to get my other number transferred, not for a prepaid piece of crap." He twisted around to look at her. "Is that a problem?"

"Um. I gave Nott your number, because I didn't have my phone with me."

"You ran into Nott? That's fantastic." He grinned. "So that's five of us now. And I only lost my phone last night, so if you've got her number, we can just call her with my new number, she'll need yours too." He pulled his new phone out of his pocket.

"I've got it," Yasha said, pulling the folded slip of paper out from under the metal buckle of her collar and handed it over to him. "But she said we can't call after dark."

"Oh, that's fine, one of you can always call or text in the morn-" Molly stopped halfway through putting her number in his phone. "...Hang on. She said we _ can't _ call after dark, not shouldn't but _ can't _?" Yasha made an affirmative sound. He put his phone down and studied her for a moment. He knew her better than anyone, even now, and knew all the subtle little tells in her face. "...What's gone wrong?"

Beau nodded, tossing back her shot. "Yeah, you said it should wait until we hooked up with Molly. That sounds like it's the kind of story you don't want to tell twice." Jester leaned forward eagerly, elbows on the table. Her ears were twitching a little in excitement.

Yasha took a deep breath and looked down at the table. She didn't like talking a lot, but there wasn't much of a way around it now. "I found Nott yesterday. Or, I mean. Frumpkin found me and led me to Nott. And I woke her up." Molly leaned against her, rubbing up and down her spine comfortingly. "She's... not a goblin, but not far from one? I don't know how to explain it. She said that something happened, and after it happened, she was different. It's..." She turned to Molly. "Do you remember when I said that Bo the Breaker and Toya smelled like Other?" He nodded, and she pointed at Jester. "You do too. Other and cinnamon." Jester giggled. "And Beau smells a little bit like it but it's just... on top of your human scent?"

Beau almost choked on her drink. "That's a sentence I never expected to hear. There's a human scent?"

Yasha nodded. "It's easier. When I'm a wolf. But I can tell. With Nott... there was human there once. But it's nearly gone. She's all different scents, but she's got an Other smell too. Except." She bit her lip thoughtfully. "With Jester and Bo the Breaker and Toya, it's like... your smell reminds me of spring. Just going into summer. Things growing and insects and small animals. But Nott's Other is like... one of those rainy awful days at the end of fall, when all the leaves have fallen and they're just a rotting wet brown mess. And it's like... something was taken away."

Jester made a soft distressed noise, and leaned into Beau, who put her arm around her without thinking about it. Beau frowned. "Did she tell you what happened to her?"

Yasha shook her head. "No. I don't think she wanted to talk about it. But she said that Caleb was with her, and that they recognized each other. Neither of them woke up, though. She said they thought it was something from before whatever happened to them."

"What happened to Caleb?" Jester asked, biting her lip."Is he all icky fall like Nott?"

"I don't know," she said quietly. "He wasn't there. She said he was resting. And she could leave him during the day. Because he was safe then."

Molly cursed under his breath. "Don't like the sound of that. Odd thing to specify, he's safe during the day, can't call at night..." He paused. "It was daylight when you ran into her, wasn't it?"

"Yes. She didn't say it specifically. But some of the things she _ did _ say..." Yasha huffed and leaned into Molly, and he obligingly shifted his hand up to run up through her braids. "I think Caleb is being held in a nest. One way or another. Nott said he either couldn't or wouldn't leave. She seemed to think she could leave when ever she wanted. But-"

"But it's Nott," Beau finished. "And she won't leave him."

"No." Yasha finished the last of her beer. "I offered. To go get him. But she thought I couldn't do it by myself. She said there were a lot of them. She also said she didn't know if he'd recognize me. I guess because he hasn't woken up. But then she said she didn't know if it would matter."

Beau groaned. "That sounds _ so _ fucking ominous..."

Yasha reached up to scratch behind her ear. "And... she also told me to tell you, Beau. She said..." She went quiet for a moment, frowning in concentration as she tried to remember Nott's wording. "She said he didn't get away here. That he tried and they caught him. And you'd know what that meant."

"Fuck!" Beau snapped, dropping her head onto the table. "Yeah, I've got a pretty good idea what that means. _ Fuck _, this just went from bad to fucking awful."

"What _ does _ it mean?" Molly asked. He was anxiously tapping his fingers on the table, probably because he didn't have a tail to lash.

"It- Fuck, I can't give you the specifics, it's not mine to tell, but the short version is he's probably going to be _ way _ more fucked in the head than normal. And also that we're probably gonna have to dust some motherfuckers." Suddenly, Beau sat straight up. "Fuck! I just remembered- fuck!" She started digging in her jeans for her phone. "I _ knew _ I ought to know that name-" She pulled her smartphone out and they could just see her load up something with a search function. From where Jester was sitting, it looked almost like some kind of news feed or maybe some kind of archive app. Beau typed something in, and flipped through articles rapidly. "No, no, no- that one was stupid too but- no, no, n- wait. Here it is." The article she'd found opened up full screen. "So, six, seven years ago, a guy shows up at the Cobalt Reserve office over in Miracle Bay. There's some hand-wringing in the report about how the hell he even knew to find us, but that's beside the point. He said he was a member of a local, uh, mage circle? Probably not the right fuckin' term but who cares. According to the report, he was half out of his head, but got his point across, the point being that a vampire had compromised the circle or whatever the fuck and this guy was the only one who'd gotten away and could we please come kill the vampire before he completely fucked over the entire circle and stole all their shit."

"I'm from Miracle Bay, and my mama still lives there," Jester said, her furry tail curling into her lap so she could hold onto it in an unconscious self-soothing gesture. "That's why I had to leave, there was a nest there. Humans like my mama are okay, most of the time, if they stay out of certain parts of town, but the Traveler said that it wasn't safe for changelings and faeries anymore."

Beau snorted. "Well, you can think the Cobalt Reserve there for it. This was assigned reading in 'why you fucking _ check things out _ even if you think it's stupid'. Apparently, the ass that took the initial report just dismissed the witness out of hand, either because the guy wasn't the most coherent, or because he bought into the propaganda that we always know everything that's going on that's out of the norm, or because he just didn't like mages. Kicked the witness, _ C. Widogast _ , out and by the time anyone got around to actually _ looking into it _ , he'd gone missing, the circle was irrevocably _ fucked _, and we ended up losing damn near all the hunters working out of that city." She tossed her phone onto the table with a pissed off noise.

"He went for help," Molly said. "It makes sense he knew about the Cobalt Reserve, if it's Caleb, he'd have kept _track_ of shit like that. Maybe he was on the verge of waking up?"

"I'd buy it," Beau said sourly. "And now I kinda feel like an asshole for that thing I said earlier about not having to call police stations."

"We're all assholes," Molly said, patting her hand and jerking back before she could punch him for it. "But we're the kind of assholes who'll get him _ back _."

Jester reached out to tug on Yasha's arm. "So we totally have to go rescue Caleb, but what about Nott? Is she okay? Are the nasty people hurting her?" She was clearly trying to sound as if she wasn't incredibly upset about the whole situation, but it wasn't coming off too well.

"She said she was safe from them. Because they thought she was Caleb's... ghoul?" She frowned; the term wasn't familiar to her. "And that he can get territorial. So I guess... they don't want to... push him too much? If that makes sense?"

Molly snarled something in Infernal that made Jester squeak and stare at him wide-eyed. Then he rubbed his face and made the effort to calm down. "They fucking turned him. ...I don't know why I'm surprised, what _ else _ would they do with him? But a ghoul is what happens when a human drinks vampire blood without losing enough of their own blood to turn." He shuddered a little. "Gustav explained it to me, why I couldn't let anyone drink my blood even as a joke, or if they were into bloodplay. It fucks with their heads, makes them practically the vampire's slave. Like legitimately 'I would fucking die for you'." He shuddered again, and next to him, Yasha couldn't help the way she growled in response. "And admittedly, I can see how Nott could give that impression, but-"

"It doesn't matter," Beau said, grabbing her phone again. "Because we're gonna get them both back. Yasha, where did you find Nott?"

"The next town up the highway."

"You started out last night, right?" She nodded. "Did you walk or get a ride?"

"Walked. I usually do."

"Okay, so it can't be that far away. Everyone, gimme your cell numbers if you've got one." The other three blinked at her, but obliged. "And gimme Nott's number." Molly shoved the slip of paper to her. "So here's what we're going to do. I know she said we couldn't call, but a text is a lot easier to cover up than a call, even if she doesn't have her phone silenced. So I'm going to text her all of our numbers, so she can get hold of all of us. And that way if one of us accidentally trashes someone else's phone it doesn't knock out the chain of communication," she said, looking away from Molly.

"I promise I'll drop yours in the toilet later if it'll make you feel better," Molly said cheekily.

"Fuck you. You said that Nott can come and go in the daytime?" Yasha nodded again as Beau finished her text to Nott. "Okay. So the best thing to do is for me and Yasha to head over tomorrow, and meet with Nott, she can tell us where to go from there. It needs to be during the day, so you might as well stay put. Jester, you too. You're our back up. You both chill here until we get back, if something goes wrong we'll call you."

"How are you going to get there?"

"I can hotwire a fucking car, Molly." She usually sounded pissed off, but they could all tell she was taking this incredibly personally, and dealing with it the only way she knew how to. "The idea is, Yasha and I get over there, Nott shows us where the nest is, we go in during the day and deal with anyone we need to, wait for Caleb to wake up, then get him and Nott back here as soon as we can. We can go from there."

Molly nodded. "I can't say I like it, but it seems like the safest bet for everyone."

"Yeah, Molly and I can bail you out if you get arrested~!" Jester said, nodding and patting Beau's shoulder.

"And I can start hunting around for a place he can crash tonight," Molly said. "The RV back at the carnival is already kind of cramped. I think if he didn't riot the twins would."

Jester brightened. "Ooh! Does it need to be some place special?"

"Not really, just so the sun can't get in."

"Maybe we can get like blackout curtains for my hotel room~!"

"Can't hurt to lo-" Molly cut off as Beau's cellphone produced a series of chirping notes. "...Beau, is that the thing from Power Rangers?"

"Shut up. Fuck you." She flushed, flicking through her lockscreen to check the message.

"Hey, no judgement. It was a good show. I'm sure I've done weirder." She opened her mouth to tell him to go fuck himself, then stopped and frowned. "What is it?"

"You know how all our plans eventually get fucked?"

"Yeeeeeeeees..?"

"I think the fucking just happened." She sent another text quickly, then held her phone out so they could see it. Nott had replied to Beau's text with all of their numbers.

_ Nott: Can you come tonihgt? _

_ Nott: As soon as posisble _

_ Me: ? we were gonna raid the place tomorrow during the day _

"Oh no," Yasha said softly.

"Oh _ good _ , I _thought_ we needed more ominous bullshit..." Molly said, resuming his nervous finger-tapping.

Beau's phone chirped six notes again, and another text popped up.

_ Nott: Clan head is coming tonight _

_ Nott: Ikitnon _

Beau stared at it. "Fuck. _ Shit. Fuck _ . I knew it was bad but I didn't want it to be _ that _ bad-" She cut herself off, and shoved away from the table, tossing her phone into the middle of it. "Get the address out of her. I'm gonna go hotwire a fucking car." Then she darted outside.

Jester obligingly picked up the phone and texted Nott back. Molly nodded firmly. "If we're going tonight, I'm coming. I might have an advantage if we're going into a nest."

"I'm coming too," Jester said quietly, without a trace of her normal irreverence or sunny smile.

"No, Jester, you said it wasn't safe for you to be around them-"

"It's not safe for you either," she pointed out, not looking up at him, but wearing a particularly determined expression. "I'm coming."

"You were okay with staying behind before. Please, Jes."

She shook her head. "That was when we were _both_ staying behind while Beau and Yasha were going in the _daylight_ when everyone would be _asleep_. This is _ different _." She put the phone down and looked up, not at Molly but at Yasha. "I'm coming," she said again.

Something unspoken passed between the two of them, something that was too complex for Molly to work out in the momentary silence. "Okay," Yasha said softly. "Jester's coming."

Well, there was no point in arguing with both of them. "Come on, let's go find Beau and get out of here."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Update schedule is probably going to change a bit, I'm nearing the end of what I already have written and this is not a quick story to write XD Probably going to go to every two weeks for now instead of once a week.


	8. Chantry

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Caleb needs help and they have a few assholes to kill.

_ Vampire lairs can take many forms. Some prefer a regular house or apartment, indistinguishable from anyone else's, save only that it has been rendered sunlight proof. Some have a strong aesthetic sense and are drawn to more traditional structures, such as church crypts or houses of the gothic or Victorian style. Some are forced to make do with whatever they can find, be it a car with blacked out windows, an abandoned warehouse, or even an accessible sewer or storm drain. The only real requirement is that it is a place where the sun can be kept out. Some vampires prefer to have coffins available to sleep in, but that is not a necessity, rather it is a choice often made for the sake of tradition. The only other consideration that means anything is that a lair should be a place where one can keep to themselves without being found or disturbed, for fairly obvious reasons... _

\- BE, "World of Darkness: Essays on the Supernatural"

* * *

Beau had gotten them a big SUV parked in a red zone near the bar. It was unclear as to whether or not it was the closest thing to hand, or if she'd anticipated everyone coming with. It honestly probably didn't matter. Jester did something to the license plate that none of them could quite catch which she assured them would make it so that they shouldn't get pulled over, to which Beau said it looked like she'd gone over it with a neon pink highlighter.

Though they were in a rush at this point, Molly was able to talk them into swinging by the fairgrounds on their way out of town. He spent a few minutes giving Gustav the basics, that a friend of his was in trouble and needed help right away, and Molly might not be back. Gustav didn't protest as much as he might have otherwise; it had never been a secret that Molly would be moving on one day. And he understood dropping everything to help someone close. Molly left with his prop swords and Gustav's best wishes.

Besides, Molly thought it was high time for the carnival to move on as well; a Cobalt Reserve presence in this city wasn't the safest prospect for three vampires and other associated weirdos, as Beau freely admitted.

It wasn't a long detour, and ten minutes later, they were on the highway, Beau driving and Yasha in the passenger seat with her window down so she could tell her where to turn, with Jester lying across the backseat with her head in Molly's lap. No one said much. Everything they could say they already had, at least until they picked up Nott.

Beau wasn't a maniac behind the wheel the way Molly was, but she wasn't exactly adhering to the speed limit either, and driving down the highway ate up the miles a lot faster than even a big wolf's top speed, and it only took them an hour and forty five minutes to cover the same distance it had taken Yasha well over twelve hours to come on her own. Yasha gave Beau directions now and again, and it was just turning eleven when they got off at the exit ramp she indicated. The address that Jester had gotten from Nott proved to be the same bar that Yasha had first picked up her scent.

It was still open this time of night, but there weren't many cars in the parking lot. Beau found a spot near the back of it, and they all piled out, looking around. "Are we early?" Beau asked, leaning against the SUV's door. "I don't see her."

Jester shrugged, biting her thumbnail. "She said she'd be here for a while, because we didn't know how long it would take, and also because she said she wanted to get good and drunk."

"Maybe she's inside?" Molly suggested.

  
  
"No," Yasha said softly. "She's around. I can tell."

  
  
It was Beau that spotted her first as they all looked around, lamplight eyes shining out at them from the shadow of a large bush at the edge of the parking lot. "Nott?" There was no response at first, then the shadows seemed to shift a bit and pull back, and she was standing there peering at them nervously from under her ratty, oversized gray hoodie. She had always been the smallest of the Nein, and that was true now; she might have just broken four feet even. But it was definitely her.

  
  
Nott took a swig from the flask she'd produced from the pocket of her hoodie. "Beau? Oh thank god, we-" She'd taken two steps forward towards Beau, just as Molly and Jester came up from the other side of the car. It was a completely involuntary reaction, they could all tell. Maybe that's what was so awful about it. Nott's eyes widened in a way that would have been comical if it wasn't so heartbreaking, and she let out a choked off shriek of fear before bolting.

  
  
Molly had just closed his eyes in resignation and hurt he couldn't quite hide when he felt Nott behind him, pressing close with her hands fisted in the tail of his untucked shirt. He could feel her shaking, and when he lifted his arm to turn slightly to look back at her in surprise, she had her eyes shut tight. She was hiding, using him as cover. He blinked, at a loss. If she was hiding behind him, then he obviously wasn't what had set her off. She'd reacted instinctively, and instinct had sent her to cower behind, of all people, the vampire. Which at least suggested they'd been right about Caleb.

  
  
But if she wasn't afraid of _ Molly _ , who was she-

  
  
Molly and Beau realized it at the same time. If she hadn't been alarmed by Beau, and she had already encountered Yasha, and it was Molly she was hiding behind, that only left one possibility. They both looked at Jester at the same time, and she was standing there with both hands to her mouth in horror. "Oh _ Nott _ ," she said, her voice breaking with grief and worry as tears started to run down her face. "Nott, what _ happened _ to you?"

  
  
Nott was still clinging to Molly, her forehead pressed to his back and muttering to herself. "Jester. It's _ Jester _ . She's not _ one _ of them, she's not _ like _ them. She won't hurt me. She won't take-" Her voice was tiny and barely there, and it shook just as much as the rest of her did.

  
  
"...Nott?" Molly turned a little more, and she released her grip on his shirt to cover her wizened face with both hands. At a loss, he hugged her. He was a very tactile person, had always been. He wasn't sure exactly where Nott fell on that particular line but right now she welcomed the affection, leaning into him and shuddering.

  
  
Jester was standing back where she'd stopped, her hands doubled up into fists pressed against her mouth. Every line of her body screamed that she wanted to run forward and wrap Nott up in a hug, but she stayed put. Beau and Yasha exchanged a glance, and Yasha quietly moved over to Jester and pulled her into a hug the same way she would Molly. Jester sniffled and leaned into the comfort, lowering her hands to wrap her arms around herself.

  
  
Beau moved over to where Nott was leaning into Molly. Now that she was closer, she could see that Nott had a sort of aura too. But where Jester's made her brighter and Molly's made him seem more sinister and Yasha's was brown and alive, Nott's was more like... static. It fuzzed all her outlines, and she looked as if she was standing half a step out of phase with everything. It was weird and it seemed fundamentally _wrong_ in a way that she didn't understand. She squatted down to put herself more on Nott's level and awkwardly patted her shoulder. "Nott? You okay?" It was a stupid question, of course, but sometimes the stupid questions helped.

  
  
"...I didn't... I didn't think to ask," Nott said in a wobbly tone. "I thought... I thought everyone would be like you, or like Caleb and Molly. Or Yasha. Or... I didn't think about... I wasn't expecting it. And... and... I saw that. First. Before I saw Jester."

  
  
"You saw what, Nott?" Beau asked, in a surprisingly gentle way. Molly made an encouraging sound and rubbed her back.

  
  
"...A faerie," Nott whispered.

  
  
Beau bit her lip. "Faeries scare you?" She wasn't sure how much to push this.

  
  
"...Some do. And I know Jester's not the same kind and even if she was it's _ Jester _ but I wasn't..." She trailed off.

  
  
"...Instincts are a bitch," Molly said quietly, and bent down to kiss the top of her head.

  
  
"Yeah." She took another gulp from her flask.

  
  
"...You wanna tell us what happened?" Beau asked after a moment.

  
  
Nott took a shuddering breath, then stepped away from Molly to timidly approach Jester, who immediately dropped to her knees and held her arms out to Nott. After another perceptible hesitation, Nott closed the distance and settled into Jester's hug. "I... I don't remember how long ago it was. But I... I stole a button. And normally, that's okay, buttons are so small no one notices, right? But this time I stole the wrong button." Jester made a distressed noise and cuddled her a bit more firmly. "You don't take things from the Fae. Not even buttons. So... so they took me away. To the place on the other side of the veil. And they... they changed me. They made me this," she said, gesturing at herself.

  
  
Jester took a moment to wipe fresh tears out of her eyes. "There's a rule against doing that, for changelings. That's why I had to ask if it was okay if I could enchant you, Beau. We're forbidden from taking mortals into the other side without permission, or even showing it to them, and we have to look after them when we do. The Faerie realm isn't good for them."

  
  
Nott nodded. "But the True Fae don't have that rule. And... and... they're..."

  
  
Jester rubbed circles in Nott's back. "They're cruel. They're mean and awful and selfish and they don't know any other way to _ be _ . The Traveler said that changelings are different because we're technically human too, technically, or at least, we know how to _ be _ human."

  
  
"And... and... they made me... I was enforcing the rules. Punishing people who... I didn't _want_ to," Nott said miserably. "But I couldn't fight them... it took me so long to get away. Every time I tried I... I couldn't find my way back through, not without help."

  
  
"...Caleb," Yasha said softly, as she sat down on the ground nearby.

  
  
Nott nodded again. "He asked Frumpkin to lead me back to this side."

  
  
Beau had also sat down on the ground, once Nott was firmly settled in Jester's lap. "Wait. They did this to you over a fucking button?"

  
  
"It doesn't matter what it is," Nott whispered. "You don't take what belongs to a Faerie."

  
  
Beau felt the righteous anger building in her, and she cracked her knuckles. "Those motherf-"

  
  
"NO!" Nott yelped, and practically flung herself out of Jester's arms to leap at Beau, covering her mouth before she could finish the word. "Don't! You shouldn't talk about them at all if you can help it and never say anything insulting about them!"

  
  
Beau pulled away, mad as hell. "But they-"

  
  
Nott clapped both of her hands over Beau's mouth again. "Don't! Their rules are stupid and arbitrary but they _ mean _ them and if you break them, they'll..." She started to cry. "I don't want them to take any of you away too," she whispered.

  
  
Beau growled in frustration, but let it go. At least mostly. "You didn't stop Jester just now," she pointed out.

  
  
Jester shook her head. "Changelings are faeries too. We don't have to follow the same rules. It's technically not fair, technically, but it's the way it is."   
  


Nott nodded, fumbling with her flask. "...Sorry I was afraid of you, Jester."

Jester brushed Nott's hair out of her face and kissed her forehead. "It's okay, Nott. I know you weren't _really_ afraid of _ me _ . And okay, it _ did _ hurt a little, but the worst part was that I knew why you ran away, and how much they must have hurt you..." She cuddled Nott again. "But at least you're free now? Caleb got you out, right?"

Nott nodded miserably, leaning against Jester. "He did... but now I can't get _ him _ out. And I wish we could have waited until tomorrow, it would have been a lot easier. But... but Ikithon's going to be here tonight. And there's... he _ does _ something to Caleb. There's a little bit less of him _ left _ every time Ikithon gets him cornered. And... and he can't disobey him," Nott said, her voice cracking.

Molly frowned. "I've heard that name before somewhere, haven't I?"

Jester looked over at Beau. "Is that the guy Caleb told us about, that hurt him so bad?"

"Yeah. He's a _ motherfucker _ ," Beau said, scowling. "And I am _ absolutely _ going to dust his fucking ass but first we have to get Caleb the fuck out of there and _ away _ from him."

"Wait, wait, what guy hurt Caleb? What?" Molly looked between them, confused.

Beau shrugged irritably. "Long, ugly story that I'm not telling you until Caleb says I can. Doesn't matter right now anyway. What does matter is we need to find this place and kick as much ass as we have to to get to Caleb."

Nott drained her flask and nodded. "I can show you the way."

* * *

Their destination proved to be a large, nearly decrepit mansion on the outskirts of town. Yasha huffed and rubbed at her nose as they approached, but didn't say anything. Nott had led them to a side door she said should be away from everyone, and the lack of lights in this part of the house suggested she was correct. Here, they paused at the door. "I usually go through the window," she said quietly. "It's easier. They keep the door locked and I can't pick it."

"Well, how sneaky are we trying to be?" Molly asked reasonably. "Locks can be broken."

"Let me," Jester said, reaching for the door.

"No, wait, it's-" Nott was too late, and Jester couldn't help yelping as her hand closed around the handle. She jerked back, automatically sticking her burned fingers in her mouth. "-iron," Nott finished. "That's why I can't pick it. _ Neither _ of us can touch it."

"I can touch iron," Yasha said quietly, taking a stride forward.

Beau held her hand up, halting her. "Let me try first, the element of surprise is fucking awesome." She knelt down and pulled something out of her pocket. "Being a juvenile delinquent has its advantages." She worked on the lock for a couple of minutes, her tongue sticking out of her mouth in concentration. "You're so much better at this, Nott..." she grumbled. Then the lock clicked. "But at least it's a pretty shitty lock."

"If we've got any luck at all, most of the lower ranking members of the clan should be out hunting by now," Nott whispered. "And even if they're not, with all of us, there's only two we have to worry about, Astrid and Eodwulf. They're in charge. And Caleb."

"Do you think we beat Ikithon here?" Beau whispered as she slid in through the open door, looking around, with Molly behind her.

"I hope so." Nott ducked around the two of them, Yasha bringing up the rear. When no one was looking, Jester had shifted into her ferret form, and now ran up Beau's leg to perch on her shoulder.

"That's so weird," Beau whispered, giving the ferret a glance. "It's like Frumpkin but not." The ferret chirped at her, then nuzzled Beau's cheek.

Nott just motioned them to follow her, and she led them through the halls to the more occupied areas of the mansion. Their luck was holding, it seemed, because they didn't encounter anyone until Nott stopped abruptly near a corner. There was a light on in the room nearby, and they could just hear a feminine voice in conversation, though they couldn't understand the language she was speaking in. "Astrid," Nott whispered. She listened for a moment, then shook her head. "She's on the phone I think, Eodwulf's not with her."

Yasha huffed again, then her nose flared and a low growl sounded deep in her chest. Molly turned to look at her, surprised. "Yasha love? You okay?" he whispered.

They all turned to look at her, and she was definitely snarling, her lips pulled back from teeth that seemed a little too pointed. "Her smell was all over you the night I found you," she growled, managing to keep it mostly to a whisper.

Beau looked from Yasha to Molly, then raised an eyebrow and mouthed 'body dump?' at him. He nodded slightly, biting his lip. Jester made an inquisitive squeak, and Nott frowned. "What do you mean, the night you found him?"

Molly sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. "Someone, uh, ripped my throat out and left me for dead. And then Yasha had to ask Gustav to do something that didn't make anyone happy. And here I stand before you now."

Nott's eyes widened. "Three months ago, Astrid and Eodwulf came home one night and he had scratches all over his face and she had cuts all up and down her arms and her dress was covered in blood, it was ruined. Caleb asked about it, because she's usually pretty fastidious. She said they'd had to teach a lesson to a ...the Zemni- er, German word for 'son of a bitch' I think, 'that didn't know when to quit'."

"Sounds about right," Molly whispered, nodding. "Glad to know I did manage to leave marks on them and ruin the bitch's dress at least..." Jester squeaked in dismay, and jumped from Beau's shoulder to his, her feet scrabbling for purchase in his shirt before she found a stable perch and nuzzled him where his tattoo curled around his jaw. "Heh. Thanks, Jes." He gave the ferret an affectionate skritch. He started to say something else, but cut off as Nott hissed slightly.

The door opened and they all pressed themselves against the wall. A tall blonde came out and went further down the hall. Yasha started to take a step forward, but Beau grabbed her shirt and shook her head. Nott watched her continue on before another door opened and she disappeared, then relaxed. "She's gone."

Yasha fixed Beau with a look. "That one's mine."

"Fair enough, I wasn't really planning on leaving any of these assholes in one piece. But we should figure out where the other asshole and Caleb are first."

After a moment, Yasha nodded. "Okay."

Jester squeaked, and chittered at Nott. Nott blinked. "You sure?" More chittering. "I guess. Just be careful. They don't really _ see _ me, most of the time, but it might be different for you. He's probably in the basement." Jester squeaked again, then nodded, and nipped affectionately at Molly's cheek. Then she jumped down and scurried off.

"What the-" Molly almost went after her, but she was gone before he could. "Where's she going?"

"She said she was going to look for Caleb, since she'll attract the least attention in this form." And to be fair, there wasn't a lot they could _ say _ against that; a ferret could stay hidden a lot better than most of them, and they needed Nott to guide them around the house. "Eodwulf likes to spend most of his time in the billiard room, that's a good place to look..." She motioned them to follow her again. "If we can keep them apart, it'll go a lot easier. They're... scary. Together."

Beau nodded. "Split up, maybe? Do you think two of us can take one of them?"

Nott shrugged. "Probably." She paused. "Yasha? You said you wanted Astrid?"

Yasha nodded with a low, wordless growl.

"...I'll come with you then." There was a sort of steely bitterness in her tone, and Beau wondered just what Astrid had done to piss Nott off that much. Clearly more than just the obvious.

She didn't ask, just nodded and smirked. "Okay, so if Nott and Yasha take Astrid, that leaves the other one... Eodwulf?" Nott nodded. "Eodwulf. For me and Molly."

"I think I owe him something anyway," Molly said with a sharp smile.

* * *

Jester scurried through the hallway, pausing periodically to listen for any movement or to see what else she could sense. It wasn't easy; there was an atmosphere to this whole house that put her on edge and made her want to turn tail and run. But she wouldn't. Caleb had come for her when she was in a cold, dark place, and she wouldn't leave him in a place like that now.

But she _ did _ wish she wasn't alone.

She turned another corner and stopped, her whiskers twitching. There was something nearby, something that briefly lifted the pall over this whole place, like a breath of fresh air. After a moment, she squeaked inquisitively, and there was an answering mew. Frumpkin turned the corner and came over to her, purring like mad. He was actually a little bigger than she was in this form, and promptly started grooming the top of her head. Jester chittered at him and nuzzled back. It was interesting; he was _fey_ but not _Fae_, and she hadn't even known there was a _difference_.

They didn't talk to each other, exactly, not in words, but they were more or less able to understand each other. Eventually, Jester squeaked a question, and Frumpkin chirped in response before giving the top of her head a final lick, and went back the way he came, with her following. If anyone knew where Caleb was, it was Frumpkin.

* * *

Beau and Molly slipped around a corner, following Nott's directions. They had split up in the dining room, with Nott and Yasha going to go find Astrid. "Who the _ fuck _ has a billiard room?" Molly hissed. "Who the fuck _ plays _ _ billiards_?"

"Murderous psycho vampires, apparently," Beau whispered back. "And this house is like... a hundred years old, maybe it came with it."

Molly started to say something else, but Beau hissed at him, just as they smelled cigar smoke, and heard balls clacking together in the next room. Molly wrinkled his nose. "Oh yeah. I remember that smell all right."

"_ Was _?" It was a gruff, male voice. "Who is there?"

Molly and Beau glanced at each other, and Beau shrugged. "Might as well," she whispered.

Molly nodded, and swung around the door. "Hi, asshole. I'm with the Circus Restoration Fund, and I've come to collect a donation."

Eodwulf proved to be a big man with dark hair and a mustache, in a sharply tailored suit that somehow didn't quite hang right on him. He put his pool cue down with a sort of exaggerated calm. "Who the devil are you, and how did you get in here?"

Molly smirked, idly spinning one of his prop swords in his hand. "Pretty nice digs. So this is what you do when you're not murdering hitchhikers?"

Eodwulf's expression shifted from mere annoyance to a scowl. "...I should have known only one person would be so tasteless as to have those tattoos."

Molly flashed a sharp-fanged grin. "Oh, how nice, you _ remember _ me~" He spun his sword again, then brought it up across the back of his neck, and the blade immediately frosted over. "I remember _ you _, motherfucker."

"I see we misjudged your resilience. I will not make the same mistake twice."

"Yeah, see, here's the thing," Molly said, with a shit-eating grin. "This time I brought a friend." Then he dropped low, charging at Eodwulf with his scimitars flashing as Beau practically vaulted over his shoulder, her aluminum staff telescoping while she was still in the air to come down on Eodwulf's shoulder with an audible crack.

Eodwulf snarled, his fangs very visible, and threw himself into the attack. He was certainly more inclined to use non-physical means of attack, but between Molly's swords and Beau's staff, they simply weren't giving him a chance to _ cast _ anything... and both of them were too smart to meet his gaze and give him a chance to bring his innate abilities to bear. But that didn't mean things were easy.

He was as strong as a bear, and even without a weapon, a lucky hit nearly sent Beau flying, and she was going to have a hell of a bruise. She managed to keep her feet, but her guard was down, and he was able to grab her by the throat. Eodwulf snarled, his jaw nearly dislocating and his fangs actually seemed to extend. She clawed at his wrist trying to make him drop her to no avail. He hissed, and leaned towards her.

However, he didn't get close enough to do real harm, because Molly appeared behind him and plunged both scimitars into his back, twisting them until he dropped Beau. "Fuck you, asshole," he snarled, Infernal tinging his words. "You don't get to _ do _ that."

"_ Gottverdammt _-"

"Go to hell, motherfucker," Beau snapped as she came up swinging. With Molly holding him in place with the swords in his back, Eodwulf had no chance of dodging away, and before he could say anything else, Beau had planted a long stake square in his chest. His face lost what little color it had, his eyes rolled back in his head, and he sagged against Molly, entirely limp.

Molly blinked. "...I thought he was supposed to turn into dust?"

"Nah, once they're past a certain age, it just incapacitates them."

"So you wouldn't have ashed me if you'd hit your mark?"

"Fuck no, dude. You're only three months old, you'd have been _ super _ fucked."

He stuck his tongue out her, and shoved Eodwulf's body off of his scimitars to let him fall in a heap. "Then how do we kill this son of a bitch? I don't feel like him waking up and coming to complain to the management."

Beau shrugged, then winced as it pulled on her new bruise. "Cutting their head off usually works."

Molly looked down at Eodwulf. "Oh." Then he looked at his scimitars, and swung hard.

* * *

Jester followed Frumpkin through back passages, and occasionally small holes in the wall, until they wound up in the cellar. The unpleasant, cold feeling was worse down here, but Frumpkin seemed to hold the worst of it at bay, and she stuck close to the cat. Then Frumpkin nudged a door open at the end of the corridor, and everything seemed to relax. It was a big room, full of well-organized shelves that she was already itching to start rearranging and knocking things off of. Frumpkin padded across the room to a desk at the back and meowed.

Caleb shifted in his chair, then looked down at the cat with a tired smile. "Ah, there you are, _ mein Freund _ . You have been out exploring, _ ja _?" He looked shabby, but then, he somehow did most of the time. He was wearing worn slacks and a sweater that was two sizes too big for him, and he had ink all over his hands and a smudge on his face. He picked Frumpkin up to cuddle him, scratching behind his ears and murmuring in Zemnian. Frumpkin purred and headbutted him, then moved to drape himself around Caleb's shoulders. Then Jester squeaked, and he looked down at her in surprise. "Oh, you have, you have brought a friend?" He reached up to pet Frumpkin again. "I know you do not like it here, I do not like it here either, but I am not sure- A cat is one thing, but I suspect Eodwulf may draw the line at a ferret, even such a cute ferret." He started casting around for something. "I can get some water for you, but I do not think you can stay. You would not like it here anyway-"

"No, I really _really_ don't, but you don't either and now you can leave." While his attention had been elsewhere, she had shifted back to her normal form.

"...ah-" He straightened up when she spoke, staring at her with a blank lack of expression that she recognized as the one he got when he was trying to process something that was just too much. He looked at her, then at Frumpkin who was still purring on his shoulder, then back at her. "I- you should not, you should not be here. It isn't... it is not safe. Not for anyone, but especially... not for someone like you. You should go, if you are quick they will all miss you."

Jester's face fell. "You don't recognize me, Cayleb?"

He started a little, but shook his head, looking somewhere around the baseboard of the wall behind her. "I am sorry, but no. You really should- I don't want to hurt you, but I can't, I can't protect you if the others find you."

Well, she had _known_ that Nott hadn't been able to wake him up, hadn't she? It might just be this one was going to be _tricky_. They could sort it out later. She gave him her most cheerful smile. "It's okay if you don't remember me, Cayleb, I know you will sooner or later~ But right now, we're here to get you out~! So come on~"

The expression on his face could only be described as one of utter shock, and he started rubbing his forearms in agitation. "Out? I don't- I can't-"

She reached out to grab his hands, careful to give him enough time to see what she was doing so he wouldn't spook. "Nott said you needed help. So we're here to help you." Even he seemed a little surprised when he didn't pull away. "If you can't fight back, we'll fight them _for_ you," she said gently. "And, you know, we're like, really _super_ strong."

He very clearly wanted to say something, what, Jester had no idea. She wasn't sure he had any idea either, because he opened and shut his mouth a few times without getting anything out. "...I-" But he was cut off by a loud snarling and howling from upstairs that they could hear even down here.

Jester jumped. "Yasha!"

"...What the hell is- _ Scheiße _." Caleb snapped out of his daze and thrust Frumpkin into her arms. "He can show you the way out. Get out of here, before they find you." Then he headed for the stairs.

And naturally, Jester followed him, still holding Frumpkin.


	9. Bloodbound

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It was a good plan... until now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So after this point, the posting schedule is going to go wonky, as we're through what I have finished. I promise I will finish this monster... but we've still got a fair bit to go~

_Vampire blood has some interesting properties. In addition to the way it functions in creating new vampires, it can be considered one of the most effective, complex, and_ dangerous_ mind__ affecting drugs in the world. While the mechanics are unclear, it has a profound effect on the mind and willpower of those that ingest it. When administered by one who knows its properties intimately and is skilled with judging the doses, it can affect not only memory, but the very free will of the victim. The victim finds themself completely under the sway of the vampire whose blood they have injested, unless they possess a profound sense of self and an iron will that goes infinitely beyond simple stubbornness. The severity of the effects and the level of control that can be exerted by the vampire in question are dependent on a multitude of factors, including the strength of the dose and the proximity of the vampire. Cumulative doses can increase the severity up to a point, though research suggests it will then level off. While humans are quite susceptible to this substance, it is worth noting that other vampires are not immune..._

\- BE, "World of Darkness: Essays on the Supernatural"

* * *

It had always felt right to have a crossbow in her hands, and now Nott understood why. She'd stolen this one a couple of years ago after a lucky discovery in a pawn shop. She just hadn't had much of a chance to use it, outside of skewering the odd rat while everyone was asleep. But she sure as _hell_ had a chance to use it now, and had a whole bundle of wooden bolts she'd made for _exactly_ this purpose.

Finding Astrid had been easy enough; she'd been sitting in the study, a book in her lap and a wineglass that absolutely did _not_ contain wine on the side table. There was, admittedly, a part of Nott that was contrite about inevitably ruining one of Caleb's books.

The rest of her just wanted to see that bitch _burn_.

Yasha had never been one for subtlety. Never ever. And now, on her way to settle a grudge against someone who'd attacked Molly, technically _killed_ him, well, she was even less subtle than that.

She knocked the door off the hinges.

Astrid came out of her chair like a rocket, swearing in a most unladylike fashion. "What is the meaning of this?!" As Nott had predicted, the book went flying, and she could hear the binding tear as it did. She suppressed a wince. Caleb would get over it in time. Meanwhile, she slid into the room in Yasha's wake, lurking in the corners and waiting for the right moment.

"You tried to kill my friend, my heart," Yasha snarled. Her teeth were sharper than ever.

"I'm sure I did," Astrid sneered. "If you're seeking to join them, I shall be happy to oblige you."

Yasha didn't bother responding. She just shifted, brindled fur rippling down her body as her fingers lengthened into claws and she picked up another eight inches of height. She snarled as her jaw extended and within half a minute, she towered above Astrid, and howled.

"..._Ah_." Astrid had instinctively taken a few steps back when Yasha shifted. but now she gave an answering snarl of her own, showing her fangs. She didn't immediately attack, but hissed something unintelligible then lunged to the side. She shrieked as two of Nott's crossbow bolts found their mark in her side, and she spared a malevolent glance. "I'll see to you later, _vermin_. He shall just have to forgive me for putting his pet down." Something glimmered on the desk, and she snatched a letter opener up and held it like a dagger.

Yasha just snarled again and leapt forward with her claws extended.

Astrid responded in kind, bringing the letter opener up to slash at Yasha before dodging back out of the way. There was a sizzling sound, and Yasha roared in pain and jerked her burned arm back. The silver letter opener in Astrid's hand glinted, and she unhinged her jaw to hiss at Yasha, before moving forward again.

Yasha had learned not to disregard the letter opener, and caught Astrid's arm as she swung again. Unfortunately, it meant that she couldn't bring her full strength to bear. And if she had to be careful, they were too evenly matched. Astrid wasn't strong enough to break out of Yasha's grip, but Yasha couldn't get the leverage to claw her to ribbons.

That did not stop her from _trying_.

Nott scrambled around, trying not to be caught underfoot. She just needed an _opening_-

Yasha forced Astrid back several steps, snapping in her face. Astrid cursed as she collided with a vaguely antique credenza up against one wall. And that was what Nott had been waiting for. She darted forward, scrambling up onto the furniture to jump on Astrid's back. Even with Yasha holding her in an iron grip, Astrid would throw her off almost immediately... but she only needed a few seconds. Just enough to get something round her wrist.

Her magic was a strange, wavery, half-stolen thing. You didn't steal what belonged to the Faerie, she'd learned that lesson entirely too well. But they'd taken her away and changed her, made her more like them. And they couldn't help giving her some of their magic in the process. She had absolutely no intention of giving it back, even now that she was back on this side of the veil, because _fuck 'em._ But it wasn't simple for her to use. It took some preparation. Hair, and graveyard nettles, and threads from a burial shroud that had been expensive to trade for. All braided up into a cord that shouldn't be as smooth as it was.  Blessings didn't come easy to her, not at all, and there were only a few she was willing to even try it for... 

But _curses_ were made of spite and fear and she had more than enough of both to spare.

She got the cord looped around the wrist holding the letter opener and knotted it tight before Astrid tore her off her back with her other hand and practically flung her across the room. But Nott knew how to roll with it, and she didn't suffer more than a few scrapes when she bounced off the desk and into the wall. Then Astrid screamed as the curse seeped into her. She dropped the letter opener and tried to claw at the cord around her wrist, but even if Yasha's grip on her wasn't blocking her, she wasn't getting _that_ off without a faerie's help.

_Good luck with that._

Astrid's arm was withering and twisting into a gnarled, useless claw, so ineffectual that she couldn't even _try_ to yank it out of Yasha's grip. It was a curse five years in the making. Five years of putting up with Astrid's verbal abuse and veiled threats, her extortion, her pointless cruelty. Five years of _Yes Miss Astrid_ and _No Miss Astrid_. Five _years_ of watching her enjoy holding Caleb's leash far too much and yanking it far too often. _Five years_ of Caleb wearing himself ever thinner while Astrid just watched. **_Five years_** of her calling Caleb 'my love' while she helped try to destroy _everything_ he _was_.

Five years. And not an _hour_ more.

Yasha yelped as the letter opener grazed her and the silver burned her again. But with Astrid disarmed, she had a hell of a better chance of doing some damage. A burn was negligible. If she didn't have to worry about _that_ any more, she was willing to get a _lot_ more reckless.

Astrid knew that too. She was a lot of things, and most of them were terrible, but _stupid_ had never been one of them. She was well aware of the fact that with a useless arm and her only effective weapon knocked out of her hands, even she could do very little against a fully enraged werewolf in hybrid form.

Not by herself, anyway.

As Yasha pulled one massive claw back to deliver what could well be a killing blow, Astrid fumbled around behind her and caught up the first heavy object that came to her hand, a dusty crystal wine decanter. And then she smashed it into the side of Yasha's head as hard as she could. Yasha snarled in pain and instinctively brought one paw up to the injury. It gave Astrid just enough slack to yank her withered arm out of Yasha's grip, and she bolted into the hall. "_EODWULF!_ I need you!"

"Sorry, darling. I'm afraid he's not taking any calls," Molly said as he swung out of the billiard room, his scimitars at the ready. "And I've got a score to settle with you too, now that I think about it."

Astrid snarled something vicious in the Zemnian this world called German. "-should have cut your heart out when I had the _chance_, damn you!"

Yasha barrelled out of the study after her, ignoring the blood dripping down her muzzle and the way her claws left gouges in the wooden floor. Nott was right behind her, a little mote of shadow in the werewolf's wake. Molly laughed in a slightly unhinged sounding way. "Should have, didn't," he replied, Infernal making his words sharp. "And I am a _hard_ motherfucker to keep dead." Beau was right behind him, spinning her staff in one hand and studying Astrid with the same kind of cold appraisal Astrid herself usually reserved for her prey. Astrid backed towards the stairs.

She hissed at Yasha as she closed the distance, and started to mutter an incantation under her breath. Yasha stumbled when the charm hit her, but just shook her head and kept going. A crossbow bolt found its mark in Astrid's throat before she could get another one off. She coughed as she tore it out and narrowly dodged Yasha's swing. Astrid had more room to evade here and was a little faster than Yasha was in this form. Yasha's heavy blow collided with a decorative urn on a pedestal. It went flying to smash on the floor right in front of a door just as it opened.

"Whaaaaat the hell is going on?"

* * *

Caleb had opened the basement door just as an urn shattered almost precisely at his feet. He looked around at everyone with a mixture of alarm and confusion, trying to make sense of what he was seeing. His appearance seemed to shock everyone, and whatever the _hell_ had been going on paused. If briefly.

"Bren! _Mein Liebe!_ Help me! I cannot... _that_ one is too strong for me alone, and Eodwulf will not _answer!"_ Astrid had taken advantage of the distraction to scramble up the stairs, putting some distance between her and what was unmistakably a very irate werewolf. Something was wrong with her arm, but there had clearly been a hell of a fight already.

Time went a little funny for Caleb. It was one of those moments where everything seemed to stop and the seconds stretched and stretched until they meant nothing. Like the whole world was holding its breath. He looked around again, pieces slotting into place. He had no idea who these people were... barring Nott... but at the same time, there was a strange sort of half-familiarity, like he should _know_ who they were, like he _would_ if they looked a little different.

Like a dream he couldn't remember.

Unbidden, Nott's voice sounded in his memory. _"And you don't know it yet, but we have friends. There are people out there who will help us."_

That changeling girl, the one he kept wanting to call blue even though she wasn't, had known his name, his _real_ name. She had called him _Caleb,_ her accent stretching it in a way that was somehow comforting. Only Nott called him Caleb, the rest of the clan accepting his excuse that it was foolishness to give a faerie one's true name. Only Nott knew that he hadn't felt right in Bren's skin since... since Before.

_ "We're like, really super strong." _

This group of... of... of _maniacs,_ they had broken in here. Doubtless Nott had aided and abetted, but that didn't change the fact that they had broken into a _vampire den_ and they had to _know_ that's what they were doing. And they were such a motley, _mismatched_ crew. Just from his quick glance, a changeling, a werewolf, two others he couldn't pin down at a glance but he wouldn't be surprised if one or both were vampires. And Nott. Creatures that should _never_ work together but _were_.

What surprised him most was that he wasn't surprised at all.

He became aware that everyone was looking at him, like he was going to determine how things played out from here.

_ "If you can't fight back, we'll fight them for you." _

They had come to this house and had forced _Astrid,_ of all people, on the back foot. And Eodwulf wouldn't answer.

He had always been one for calculated risks. But that's not what this was. For all he knew, it was a team of hunters or someone with a grudge against the clan who had come here to wipe out everyone. Nott had endured much in this house of the dead, she wouldn't hesitate to make a temporary alliance to secure her revenge. For all he knew, they could turn on him next once they'd dealt with Astrid.

But at the same time, he knew without question that they wouldn't.

He'd also endured much, and for the third time in his life, he acted without really understanding why he was doing so. "...No," he said quietly. "I will not."

"_Mein Liebe-_"

"_Nein,_" he said, his voice a little sharper. "The woman, the woman I loved _died._ A long time ago. And you are, you are just... the monster wearing her face."

Even as the werewolf decided to take that as a cue to bound forward, Astrid's face twisted in rage. "At least _I_ am not a traitor! And you call _me_ a monster as if you are not the worst of us! You _weak, wretched-_" Nott screeched incoherently and a crossbow bolt cut Astrid off.

"I have never said I was not," Caleb said tonelessly as the werewolf leapt on her and bore her to the ground.

* * *

After all of that, Astrid went down rather quickly. Caleb had turned away as Yasha had taken her down, and Jester couldn't really _blame_ him for not wanting to watch. He'd closed his eyes with one fist pressed to his mouth, steadfastly ignoring the sounds of combat on the stairs. It was probably going to be very messy anyway; it usually got that way when they got pissed off.

Jester shifted Frumpkin in her arms a bit, then carefully reached out to catch Caleb's other hand. "Cayleb? Are you okay?" He answered her with a half-hysterical breathless little laugh, and it was such a _Caleb_ noise that it made her hopeful. She squeezed his hand gently. "They're both gone, or at least they should be, that was the plan, they can't _keep_ you here. You can come with us." He still wouldn't look at her, but that wasn't unusual.

"It's not, it is not that _easy._" He pulled his hands away to twist at his sweater, worrying at the knit, and there were several darns in it that suggested this was a common occurrence. "I can't- I am not, I am not _permitted._ To leave without them."

Jester huffed, then reached out and booped his nose gently. "They were _really_ shitty people who did some _really_ shitty things, but they can't do anything to you anymore or tell you what to do. And they _totally_ deserved it because they were doing shitty things to you and _also_ they tried to kill Molly so I'm pretty sure Yasha technically would have wanted to kill them _anyway_ technically."

He was quiet for a moment, fumbling with his sweater. "It is.... it is _complicated._ I am..." He paused, making an incoherent, frustrated sound. Jester just waited. Patience wasn't her strong suit, it never had been, but she could wait for him to find his words. "I am _tied_ here."

"Then we'll just have to untie you~!" She giggled, and the corner of Caleb's mouth twitched up in the way it did when he wasn't quite willing to smile.

"That... I don't know if, if anyone _could,_ but somehow, somehow I think-"

Suddenly, Frumpkin fluffed up aggressively in Jester's arms and his ears flattened against his skull. Caleb stared at the cat as it gave a feral hiss. He wasn't normally very expressive, not if you didn't know him, but Jester _did_ know him, and there was a _lot_ in his face, and _none_ of it was good. "..._Nein,_" he whispered. "_Bitte, nein._"

"What in the name of Cain has been going on in here?" The front door had opened while none of them were paying attention, and a balding, bearded old man in an immaculate, if old fashioned, suit was standing in the foyer, studying everyone with disapproval. A young woman Jester didn't _think_ she recognized was standing behind him. She had a wild-eyed, half-crazed look that made Jester's skin crawl. The old man shook his head in a parody of disappointment. "Really, I expected _better_ of all of you. That you have let such... _riffraff_... into our domain." Then he looked up at the stairs, and sneered. "And that is also a disappointment, that one of my hand picked proteges couldn't handle such a small thing."

Jester glanced from the old man to Caleb. It was a good thing that vampires probably didn't need air, probably, because she was pretty sure Caleb had stopped breathing. His hands were fisted in his sweater so tightly he'd torn it. He mouthed the word '_nein_', but no sound escaped.

"Bren."

Caleb jumped like he'd been stung, and his spine went ramrod straight while his clenched fists dropped to his sides. What little color he had drained away. Jester wanted to beat that nasty old man into a greasy puddle for making Caleb look like that. She wasn't the only one, because that seemed to break the spell, and Beau snarled in a way that was actually pretty close to how Yasha sounded before lunging across the hall at the old man.

Before she covered more than a third of the distance, the unhinged looking woman that had come in behind him surged forward to meet her. Beau grunted as they collided, the force of the other woman shoving her back a few steps. She hissed at Beau, trying to claw at her throat. Beau leaned back, holding her at bay with her staff. Suddenly, the shadows seemed to flicker and blur, and Nott came out of nowhere, popping up behind the other woman to hamstring her. Beau gave her a titanic shove, and she went sprawling. Before she could recover, Beau was on her, pinning her to the ground long enough to drive a stake into her chest. The woman writhed for a moment, then promptly disintegrated into ash. Beau looked up at the old man and snarled. "You're _next,_ Dickithon." Yasha seemed to take that as a cue as well, and bounded down the stairs.

The old man, Jester supposed it was Ikithon, just made an irritated sound and gestured imperiously at Caleb. "Bren, kindly _do_ something about these uninvited guests."

Caleb took a step backwards so that he was pressing against the wall. Mutely, he shook his head ever so slightly. Jester's heart soared; he wasn't _afraid_ of them, so that wasn't why. Maybe he was starting to remember~!

Ikithon scowled.

"I see I was too lenient with you the _last_ time you defied me. I shall deal with you later. But that was _not_ a _request,_ Bren."

Caleb's face did something complicated and his hands twitched at his sides for a moment. Then his eyes fluttered and his face went slack. Jester took a step towards him, reaching out for him. "Cayleb?"

He shoved her hand away but otherwise ignored her.

* * *

"Caleb!" Beau had turned when Ikithon had addressed him, and changed course. Let Yasha handle the asshole, Caleb- He'd _been_ there, Jester almost _had_ him, but now she could see what Nott meant by Ikithon _did _something to Caleb.

That fucker needed to _die_ but right now the priority was Caleb.

He turned to look straight at her, and Beau involuntarily took a step back. They'd _all_ seen him when he wasn't there, when his mind had gone somewhere far away and a long time ago, but this was so much _worse._ He met her gaze unflinchingly, and there was just _nothing_ in his eyes. He fumbled in his pocket for something, and after a brief hesitation, pulled it out. She could guess it was some kind of spell component, but she doubted she'd be able to figure out which spell he was going for by that, even if she had been close enough to see what it was. Then he brought his hands up, one open flat, parallel to the floor, and the other on top of it at a right angle, with his thumb straight up. Beau's eyes widened and her brain skidded to a halt. "Clear the hall!" she screamed. "Scatter! _Get out of the fucking hall!"_

A wall of fire ten feet high erupted down the length of the hallway.

Molly and Nott both screeched involuntarily and scrambled backwards from the fire. Yasha and Beau dove out of the way. There was a sharp yelp and a smell of singed fur that suggested Yasha hadn't quite been quick enough, but it could have been a _lot_ fucking worse. But the main problem now was that the Wall of Fire had cut them off. It was between them and Caleb, and the only one who could reach him was Jester.

And Ikithon.

* * *

Caleb was staring at the flames blankly. It was almost but not _quite_ the way he looked when he got lost in his own head. That was always not right, but there was something even _more_ not right than normal about it now. Jester chanced moving closer to him, to tug lightly on his sweater. "Cayleb? Cayleb, we need to _go_ now," she said quietly. He didn't react, so she tugged on him again. He turned to look at her slowly, his eyes dull and without even the slight recognition he'd had before. "Cayleb, you-"

"One day, I shall teach you the meaning of _restraint_ if it is the last thing I _do,_ Bren." Ikithon's voice was heavy with disapproval. "While it was admittedly effective, your carelessness has cost us a perfectly good haven."

"Leave Cayleb alone," Jester said hotly. "It's _your_ fault anyway, _you_ made him do it!" She pulled a large swirled lollipop out of her bag, and suddenly she was holding a much larger lollipop, as big as a stop sign, and she swung it at Ikithon, hard. Unfortunately, something... _happened_ before she was able to connect, and suddenly she found herself stumbling backwards. She swore in Infernal, and got up to try again- but suddenly Caleb was in the way, staring at some point over her left shoulder.

"Now that's interesting," Ikithon purred. "A changeling. A _proper_ one, not that... half-shadow _vermin_ you were so unfortunately attached to. Bring her to me."

Caleb took a few shuffling steps towards her, and Jester found herself backing up. "What the fuck, Cayleb?" Why was she scared? This was _Caleb,_ he'd _never_ hurt any of them... when he was in his right mind. And she suddenly realized that he really, _really_ wasn't. "Cayleb, you don't have to listen to him, we can go get the others and _totally_ wreck his shit." She backed up another step and squeaked as she bumped into the wall.

He took another step forward, still staring blankly over her shoulder.

Frumpkin screeched in fury and bolted out of her arms in an orange streak. Before anyone could quite react to it, he'd scaled Ikithon like a tree and seemed to be making a determined effort to claw his face off. Ikithon screamed, then grabbed Frumpkin by the back of his neck and tore him off. "Wretched beast!" he snarled, even as Frumpkin hissed and spat and tried to attack him again. Then, with a casual viciousness that Jester just _knew_ was going to give her nightmares for _weeks,_ he flung the cat away from him as hard as he could.

Right into the Wall of Fire, and _through_ it.

_"BEAU!"_ she screamed. She didn't _know_ if Caleb could resummon him if he _poofed_ and Beau was the _only-_ even with Molly and Yasha and Nott being what they were here, Beau was the only one with the _reflexes-_ _"Catch him!"_ She saw a flash of movement in the temporary gap in the flames, followed by a combined yowling and cursing.

Caleb didn't even turn around.

Her hand tightened around her lollipop. "Cayleb, I don't want to hurt you..." She really, _really_ didn't. But she _would_ if she had to... she'd feel _bad_ about it, but she also knew he'd feel _infinitely_ worse if he hurt her.

_Beau's got Frumpkin,_ Nott's voice sounded in her head. _I'm going to try to get to you. Try to get him close to the basement. Youcanreplytothismessage._

"Okay," Jester whispered. "Okay okay okay." She started edging along the wall towards the stairs, and Caleb shifted his direction as well. So far so good... He took another step forward and reached for her, then suddenly hissed and doubled over, clutching at something under the collar of his sweater. "...Cayleb? Are you okay?"

When he straightened up, Caleb, _their_ Caleb, was looking back at her. He closed the distance between them, and this time she didn't shrink away. _"Get out of here,"_ he whispered, still clutching at whatever it was around his neck under his sweater. "He has, he has taken _everything_ away from me, even the sunrise. I will not, I will not _let him_ take _this_ too."

"Bren!" Ikithon barked impatiently, and Caleb winced, then put a hand on Jester's shoulder. It wasn't entirely voluntary. He fumbled with the object he'd been clutching, and yanked it off. Jester could just see the frayed ends of the yellow yarn that had tied it around his neck.

The shadows just inside the basement steps twisted and expanded and there was a faint sound like dead leaves blowing around. Nott peeked around the edge of the door. "Caleb! Jester! Come on!"

Jester jumped, then grabbed Caleb's hand that was on her shoulder. "Let's get out of this shithole!~" She turned towards Nott, aiming to pull Caleb along with her. They could worry about everything else outside-

But he pulled his hand away. _"Nein,"_ he said softly. She whipped around to look at him, then reached out for him again, but he caught her wrist and tucked something into her hand. "We cannot both be saved." His eyes flicked over to Nott. "It is all I can-"

_"Bren!"_ Ikithon had turned, and was starting towards them. "Do as you're _told!"_

Caleb's eyes fluttered again and his grip tightened on Jester's wrist. "Get her out of here," he whispered, and it wasn't clear if he was talking to Nott or Jester or both. Then, even as his eyes glazed over, he pushed Jester back into Nott, hard, and slammed the door behind her.

* * *

Traveling through the shadows was a little weird; everything got wavy and greyed out and a little insubstantial. Nott had grabbed her as she'd stumbled back and then everything went monochromatic. It made her a little dizzy, but it didn't last long. When everything cleared up again, they were outside again. Everyone else was standing around anxiously, looking up at the mansion as the roof started to catch. Yasha was back to her human form while Molly was finishing a haphazard bandage job on her burns and Beau paced anxiously back and forth like a caged animal with Frumpkin in her arms. When she saw them, she abruptly stopped pacing and darted over to them. "Are you all right?! Were you-" Then she looked around and realized it was just the two of them, and her face fell.

Jester shook her head miserably. "He _tried._ He really, _really_ tried you guys. Like, _super_ hard." She rubbed her eyes, stubbornly refusing to cry. "He was _awake_ for a minute, he knew who I was. But... but... he couldn't... he made us run."

"Caleb said it was all he could do," Nott whispered, rubbing Jester's back.

Jester opened her hand to reveal the charred little fabric pouch she was still clutching. "He gave- I think Icky-thong _got_ him again. At the end." Then she sniffled and wiped her face again before putting the pouch in her bag. "How's Frumpy?"

Beau looked down at the cat, which seemed to be more or less intact, then at the angry scratches covering her arms where he'd vehemently protested her keeping hold of him. "About as pissed about this as the rest of us are. But pretty much okay otherwise." She handed Frumpkin to Nott. Nott clutched him to her chest, and after a moment, he grudgingly started purring and rubbing against her face. Then Beau pulled Jester into a hug. "We'll get him _back,"_ she said fiercely.

Molly came up on the other side to join in the hug. "I don't care _what_ that bastard did to him, you _know_ how fucking stubborn we can be. And even if he's mindjacked, _he's_ still _in _there."

Beau nodded against Jester's head. "Molly's right. He put that wall down to mostly miss us. He could have _seriously_ fucked us up, and he _missed."_

Jester sniffled again. "He wouldn't hurt me... even when Icky-thong was telling him to, he wouldn't do anything to me. So... you're right. He's there." There was renewed determination in her voice. "And we're going to fucking get him back and like, _totally_ kill that asshole." Nott leaned against her, and Jester pulled her into the hug too. Then Yasha came over and awkwardly put her arms around all of them.

"....Don't get me wrong, I don't want to ruin the moment," Molly said presently. "But we probably ought to get out of here before the fire department gets here. There would be all kinds of awkward questions."

"Yeah." Beau nodded, and stepped back. "Nott, do you know if they have any other lairs here? Where would Ikithon take him?"

Nott bit her lip. "Not here... this was the only one in the city. And they drove off or killed any other clans around. But... Caleb told me once they still had a lair in Miracle Bay. He and Astrid and Eodwulf were sent here to run things... well, mostly the other two but you know what I mean, but Ikithon was at 'home base' in Miracle Bay."

Beau nodded again, making for their commandeered SUV. "Then that's where. Can you tell us where it is?"

"No," Nott shook her head miserably. "I've never been to Miracle Bay... they were already set up here when Caleb.... when Caleb found me."

"Then we'll find it," Molly said decisively, kissing the top of her head. "We're a bunch of really nosy fucks."

"We need Fjord and Caduceus," Jester said quietly. "It wasn't _enough_ with just us. We need _everyone,_ I think."

"We can find them," Yasha said softly, and squeezed Jester's shoulder. "We _will_ find them. And, um, now we've just got. Him. Ikithon. To worry about. ...Um. Well. Him and Caleb. But we can handle Caleb."

Beau jumped into the driver's seat. "So that's our plan. We find Fjord and Caduceus, we find the Miracle Bay lair, we kill the _shit_ out of Ikithon, and _we get our fucking wizard back."_

* * *

The drive passed in silence, for which Caleb was unmitigatedly grateful. He needed to concentrate on the road. He _could_ drive, he just _really_ didn't like to, it made him _nervous._ But Ikithon's original driver was a scattered pile of ashes now... and they were _really_ quite a _long_ way past what he did and didn't like mattering in the slightest.

He didn't regret it. It had been his last chance, his last bit of resistance, but he didn't regret it. He had _known_ who they were, all of them, if only for a moment, remembered who they were and who they were to him. That memory had faded under the weight of Ikithon exerting his control, but he still remembered enough to know that he'd _die_ before he let any harm come to them. Ikithon had been furious beyond words that he'd let that changeling girl go, and Caleb _knew_ he was going to pay for the act of defiance... but at least she had gotten away. Her and Nott both, and everyone else had fled the burning mansion. It was all he could reasonably ask for.

It had cost him everything he had left, but he'd do it again in a heartbeat.

He had no will of his own left any more, not to speak of, and meekly obeyed Ikithon's silent command to follow him once he'd parked the car.

"You _disappoint_ me, Bren," Ikithon said idly as they went down the cellar steps. "You had such _promise,_ and you have thrown it all away. I had high hopes for you, but you have defied me too many times, and we simply cannot have that, can we? Unfortunately, you must be punished for your insubordination. And I must do _something_ to keep you out of trouble, mustn't I?" It was a rhetorical question. No answer was expected, nor was one given.

There would be no point.

Caleb didn't regret it. Not in the slightest. And he'd _never_ take it back. He was, in fact, quite _proud_ for reasons he couldn't adequately explain even to himself. But as Ikithon picked up a long metal spike and a hammer, he _did_ wish there had been another way it could have ended.


End file.
